Winnipeg Hockey Fans Can Party Like It's 1978 with Their Team Jetting Home

After 15 years, the NHL has finally moved back to Winnipeg as True North, led by Mark Chipman and David Thomson, bought the Atlanta Thrashers from the Atlanta Spirit Group for $170 million, which includes a $60 million relocation fee (which is divided up and goes to all other 29 teams in the league).

The Board of Governors will meet on June 21 where they will vote on the transfer of ownership and relocation. The transfer of ownership will need 75 percent approval while the relocation vote will only need a majority. True North has set a goal of having 13,000 season tickets sold in that time with a three-year commitment to show the Board of Governors that there will be a loyal and committed fan base.

The team will play out of the MTS Centre (15th busiest arena in North America), which has a capacity of 15,015 with plans of expanding by 1,000 to 2,000 more in the future. It is the smallest arena in terms of capacity in the NHL, but if they sell out every game will rank 24th in the league based on the 2010-2011 attendance averages.

The Atlanta Thrashers averaged 13,469 (28th in the league). Remember, Winnipeg tickets will most likely be at full price and not discounted like many teams who have poor attendance records, thus maximizing ticket revenue.

Season tickets are expected to be from $39 to $129 a seat, which is right in line with Calgary, Edmonton and Ottawa as mid-level price ranges.

To go along with the smallest arena, Winnipeg will also have the smallest population size at 762,600 people. This is deceiving as most of this population are hockey fans and one can look no further then at Atlanta, who has a population of 5.3 million but are not hockey fans based on their attendance records (14,885 average over 11 years) and their rally of 200 to 300 people (Winnipeg had over 30,000 people rally when they left in 1996).

Other then trying to sell 13,000 season tickets in 21 days, the other major obstacles will be finding corporate sponsors to bring in money and attracting players to the area. Winnipeg gets to or past minus-40 C in the winter, which many Atlanta players are not use to and many say free agents will not want to come there.

The Minnesota Wild are eight hours away and they have been successful in their short tenure. The weighing scale will be having the warm weather and perks off the ice but playing in an empty building or having extremely cold weather with fewer perks but play in front of fans who care and show up.

A TV deal will not be hard as Sportsnet, CBC and TSN will all air their games. Rogers Sportsnet is divided into regions (Pacific-Vancouver, West-Calgary/Edmonton, Ontario-Toronto and East-Ottawa/Montreal). Sportsnet can expand even more now with adding a new region which will incorporate the Winnipeg based team as well as showing WHL games. CBC will have their Hockey Night in Canada games as well TSN will have a handful of games.

Winnipeg will play in the Southeast Division for the 2011-2012 season which includes the Washington Capitals, Tampa Bay Lightning, Carolina Hurricanes and Florida Panthers. Realignment will occur the following season, where many expect Winnipeg to move into the Northwest Division with the Vancouver Canucks, Edmonton Oilers, Calgary Flames and Minnesota Wild.

A team from the Western Conference (Detroit, Columbus, Nashville) will have to move to the Eastern Conference and a team from the Northwest (Colorado) will most likely move to the Pacific with a team from the Pacific (Dallas) moving to the Central Division. But that is all pure speculation and what will happen is unknown at this time.

What the team will be called is still to be determined. True North wants a new name/identity as the Jets were deemed a failure and the Thrashers are not the old Jets team, which Phoenix is. However, strong public and fan support wants to see the Jets return as the team name.

The Mac App ran a poll of what the team should be called if not the Jets and the results were as followed: Manitoba Moose 36.8 percent, Winnipeg Spirit 26.3 percent, Winnipeg Rebels 23.6 percent and Winnipeg Men 13.1 percent. There is talk of them being called the Winnipeg Warriors.

People will say it is unfair to the season ticket holders in Atlanta as they pour their money in to support the team and now are left without a team. It was the same in 1996 when the Jets left where the support was a lot larger. Atlanta first had an NHL team in 1972 before being moved to Calgary in 1980 becoming the team they are today the Calgary Flames.