Should Washington Have Major Junior Hockey? You Bet
In 2007-08, the United States Hockey League will welcome its 13th franchise into league play: Fargo, North Dakota (as of this writing unmascoted) will join the buzz-generating development league, skating in a brand-new 5,000-seat rink. The team will be led by former Fighting Sioux bench boss legend Dean Blais, who'll serve as coach and GM. Blais led UND to national championships in 1997 and 2000. Not a bad resume for a USHL coach.
The USHL was established in 1961 and briefly hosted professional hockey players. It returned to its present fully amateur status in 1979. By virtue of its amateur status it has a leg up on attracting prime young talent these days, as players can skate there a year or two and retain their NCAA eligibility. CHLers, of course, forfeit their NCAA eligibility.
The USHL languished in obscurity until about 2000, about which time American participation in hockey began extending well beyond its traditional geographical locales. Today the USHL isn't quite a full-fledged rival as a development league for the CHL -- but it isn't as far behind as you might imagine. Dean Blais' joining the party suggests as much. But don't take my word for it; check out the league's link to the lengthy list of players drafted by NHL clubs just this decade.
The league is concentrated compactly in small outposts of winter-sports-challenged regions of the upper Midwest: basically, Nebraska and Iowa, plus franchises in Chicago, Green Bay, Indianapolis, and Columbus. Its rosters are being fed increasingly by Sunbelt States who exposure to NHL hockey is leading to dramatic and unprecedented spikes in youth hockey participation. But don't take my word for it; check out Inside College Hockey Online's "State of the Game" breakdown from last season on the U.S. origins of D-I hockey players. Thirty two Californians skated on D-I teams last season. Increasingly the USHL is serving as a fruitful apprenticeship between Midget and top-level intercollegiate hockey in the States.
The pipeline for Major Junior hockey talent in the States is irrefutably promising and on the upswing. And at present, in its tiny geographical haven, the USHL is cluttering, virtually annually, the NHL Entry Draft's top few rounds, leading a lot of folks in American hockey circles today to ask this question: what would happen if the USHL continued to expand . . . especially if it went to the unconquered, comparatively hockey-mad East?
Fargo, incidentally, boasts a population of 74,000. Washington of course isn't anywhere near as hockey-crazed (except in its per capita tally of puck bloggers); it hasn't, for instance, hosted a World Under-20 tourney. But soon it is hosting a Frozen Four, and with a GMA population exceeding 5 million, does D.C. really need to be puck crazy to support another hockey team? This is a region that has, with reasonable success, hosted an AHL franchise (in Baltimore) in the past. Worth noting, I think, that attendance was strong at both the Baltimore and Landover arenas during many of those years.
My theory-dream here is premised on far more than a selfish interest in expanding my access points to live hockey. I think it's in the Capitals' best interest to see more high-caliber hockey take root in the region. Just as hockey players need development leagues, so too do fans: millions of puck-uninitiated in these parts need an affordable access point to the fast-paced and poorly-covered-by-the-press game on ice. Too many families today simply cannot afford NHL hockey. I still want them in hockey rinks; get them there and they'll get hooked, and hooked hockey fans will find their ways into Verizon Center eventually.
Philly spectacularly supports both the Flyers and the Phantoms, and my wager is that if the USHL placed a franchise there it'd thrive as well. A USHL team, with its unsalaried rosters, needn't fill as many seats as CHL clubs to reap profits. And like the CHL, the USHL contests its games disproportionately on weekends. Try marketing quality live Friday and Saturday night hockey in an intimate setting in these parts and charge an admission of, say, $15 and $20, and see who comes out and salutes it.
This hypothesis becomes more intriguing when you consider greater Washington's fast-rising status as a puck-talent-producing region. Vienna, Va.'s, Garrett Roe skated last season for the USHL's Indiana Ice (63 points in 57 games). Marylander Phil Axtell, now entering his sophomore season at Michigan Tech, skated for Cedar Rapids. If he'd had the opportunity to remain at home and skate for a hometown team in the USHL, would Luke Lynes have migrated all the way up to the OHL's Brampton Batallion?
Yes Washington is in its infancy as a hockey playing capital, but its achievements in a short period of time are nothing short of remarkable. One of the more intriguing stories I've heard at area rinks this summer relates to DeMatha's emergence as a hockey recruiting force. There are high school teams way up north, the account goes, that today want nothing to do with the Stags.
Having a Junior team compete here, and bolster hockey's general profile, is the logical evolution of our game that is fast growing among D.C.'s athletic families.
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