NHL News: Why They Won't Give Up on Kansas City

The Sprint Center in Kansas City is still a tempting prize for the NHL.

The arena can seat just under 18,000 hockey fans and is being tried once again for an exhibition game between the Pittsburgh Penguins and the Los Angeles Kings on September 27.

Kansas City is a failed NHL city. The expansion Kansas City Scouts moved to Denver after just two seasons in the 1970s.

Nothing has happened since then until in 2005, when ground broke to build a new arena that would house both an NHL hockey team and an NBA basketball team.

The arena opened in 2007 and it is certainly near the median of 18,000 seats that would be adequate to be the home of an NHL franchise. Kansas City is in the west, an asset in the NHL's eyes which would allow teams like Detroit and Columbus to move into the eastern conference.

It also would have a natural rivalry with St. Louis. A division of Kansas City, St. Louis, Chicago, Winnipeg and Nashville is a possibility.

The problem is that nobody knows if Kansas City is really a basketball and hockey city. Right now, the owners are only recouping their money with concerts and other cultural events.

The Kansas City Scouts left for a reason—the owners believed they could not get the support necessary to sustain an NHL franchise. Since the Scouts left, there has been little evidence to differ from that opinion.

Kansas City is a potential hockey city only in the arena owners' eyes and the NHL's eyes. Kansas City is too much like the city the NHL has expanded to since Gary Bettman became commissioner.

It's a city in a market mostly unfamiliar with hockey, but one that if successful, could be pointed to by the NHL as a reason to be awarded a rich American television contract that befits an American "big four" sport.

The NHL recently suffered a blow to those aspirations when they were forced to vacate large, American Atlanta for small, Canadian Winnipeg.

The last time an NHL experiment was tried in Kansas City it was an unmitigated flop. The New York Islanders, trying to force a new arena to be built, played an exhibition game in Kansas City to try to establish a destination to move to if the New York area did not comply with its demands.

But the game only drew a half full arena and expansion or relocation to Kansas City suffered a serious setback.

Even the Phoenix Coyotes have not tried to hang Kansas City over the city of Glendale's head.

This time around it is hoped that the Pittsburgh Penguins—who have two of the NHL's biggest stars, Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin—plus another Stanley Cup contender, the Los Angeles Kings, will be a big enough draw to get a full arena. 

This is Kansas City's chance to sell itself to the NHL for at least an expansion franchise. Troubled NHL franchises like the Islanders, Florida, Phoenix and Columbus will also be watching.

Will the September 27 game be a catalyst for Kansas City to return to the NHL or will it reveal Kansas City to be what it has been since the Scouts left?

A city that is nice to visit occasionally, but no place to house a professional athletic team.