New York Islanders moving to Brooklyn's Barclays Center

• 9 months ago
• Update
• 1 comment

1. Link
2. Facebook
3. Twitter

New York Islanders 'Never' Moving, Says Prospective Seattle NHL Owner

A sports arena that could host both an NHL and NBA team will almost certainly be built in Seattle, raising questions of just how an NHL team could find its way to the city in the near future. Could the New York Islanders, long embroiled in a testy battle with Nassau County, N.Y. regarding a new arena, be on the move to Seattle or elsewhere?

According to prospective Seattle team owner Don Levin, the answer is no. Via ESPN's Craig Custance:

"I can tell you there are not teams for sale that are available to move," Levin told ESPN the Magazine on Wednesday.

Not the Coyotes? Or maybe one day the Islanders?

"My understanding is that the Phoenix deal, [Greg Jamison] has come up with the money," Levin said. "The answer to the Islanders moving is never. They're not moving out of that market. No chance that's going to happen."

Islanders fans have long been worried about the potential that their cash-strapped, arena-poor franchise could leave it's historic roots on Long Island and find itself elsewhere. Brooklyn may not be the greatest alternative for Isles fans based further west on the Island, but it goes without saying that the new Barclays Center would be a much more desirable location for Isles fans than Seattle, Quebec City or elsewhere.

If Levin, the well-connected current owner of the AHL's Chicago Wolves, truly is in the know, it seems as though Islanders fans can relax a bit.

For more on the Islanders, check in with Lighthouse Hockey.

• over 1 year ago
• Update
• 2 comments

1. Link
2. Facebook
3. Twitter

New York Islanders Exploring Arena Offers Outside Nassau County ... And Outside New York State

The New York Islanders and owner Charles Wang are listening to offers from potential suitors from municipalities outside of Nassau County, according to Chris Botta at Islanders Point Blank. And yes, by "outside of Nassau County," we mean outside of New York State, too.

Wang does not want to leave Nassau County, and staying put remains his first choice. But when I asked top executives to confirm that Wang will only consider overtures from municipalities within the New York metropolitan area, I could not get a promise on or off the record.

"I can't guarantee that anymore," said one source on high. "They are looking at options inside and outside of New York State. It would be misleading to say New York only."

The local politics surrounding the story are absolutely fascinating -- although if you live in Nassau County, you might just have a different opinion on that -- and are outlined well in the article. We won't try to delve into them here, because we're certainly ignorant in comparison. Instead, we'll stick to the implications for the hockey team.

There are plenty of options for the Islanders on Long Island, and Wang has proven that he wants both Nassau County and Long Island to be the home of his club for the very long-term future. He could have sold the team years ago to a group from Winnipeg or Kansas City or Quebec City if that weren't the case, and he would have saved a ton of money in the process. Just as True North did with the Atlanta Thrashers, ownership from Quebec City would open the wallet for the chance to purchase the Islanders, and Wang could take that right to the bank if that was his priority.

It's obviously not, though, and this shouldn't be seen as the death of the Islanders on Long Island for that reason They could move to Suffolk County or to Queens or, as we all know, to Barclay's Center in Brooklyn. A deal could be reached at the Coliseum site in Nassau County. There are plenty of options in the New York area.

There are three years before the Islanders lease expires at the Coliseum, and Wang is certainly going to use that as a bargaining chip as much as he can. He's going to use the possibility of the Islanders leaving the New York-area altogether as a bargaining chip, too.

It's looking more and more like the Islanders could leave Nassau County, the place they've called home since birth. fIf that happens, it's really a question of just how far they wind up moving.

For more on the Islanders arena situation, check in with Lighthouse Hockey and SB Nation New York.

• over 1 year ago
• Update
• 0 comments

1. Link
2. Facebook
3. Twitter

New York Islanders To Play Preseason Game At Brooklyn's Barclays Center

The New York Islanders need a new arena. Brooklyn has a new arena, except it's not quite designed for hockey. But hey, might as well test it out and see how it goes, right? That's the implied logic at play when Charles Wang sends his team to Barclays Center, still under construction in downtown Brooklyn, for a preseason NHL game in October.

The team announced Tuesday that they'll play the New Jersey Devils on October 2 at the new building, and in the process, they made sure they accentuated all the positives of the state-of-the-art arena. Barclay's Center CEO Brett Yormark certainly made his opinion of the Islanders known, too.

"We feel Brooklyn is an untapped hockey market that offers the Islanders with an exciting opportunity to grow its fan base," Yormark said in the press release. "Barclays Center will also afford current Islander fans with great accessibility, as the Long Island Rail Road and nine subway lines will come directly to the arena at the Atlantic Terminal transit hub."

Yormark's building was built for the New Jersey Nets of the NBA, but it's part of his job to make sure it's filled as often as possible throughout the year. An NHL team calling it home goes a long way towards that goal, and the one true weakness of the Nassau Coliseum location at which the Islanders currently reside is the lack of public transportation. There's a reason Yormark mentioned the transit hub at the door step of Barclays Center, and this is likely why.

He's also not shying away from the fact that he'd love the Islanders to call Brooklyn their next home, telling Chris Botta of the New York Times that he'd love Wang and the Islanders to consider Barclay's as an option for relocation. Meanwhile, Nassau County Executive Charles Mangano is brushing aside the idea of the Islanders leaving his county, a threat symbolized in this preseason game in Brooklyn.

Islanders blog Lighthouse Hockey explained this whole situation best on Tuesday:

Charles Wang owns a team but needs an arena -- ideally one that grows his club's revenues. The Nets gang owns an arena and a team but would like more ways to fill that arena for their revenues. Nassau County owns an arena but no team and sort of needs a new arena or, at minimum, a clue about how to develop a property and answer a question they've punted for only five decades or so. Also: politics.

Where everything stands once the music stops, we don't know and won't know for some time. But for now, this is another necessary beat in the song. And it's totally by a band you've never heard of.

• almost 2 years ago
• Update
• 0 comments

1. Link
2. Facebook
3. Twitter

New York Islanders Future In Limbo: Is Brooklyn's Barclays Center An Option?

Technically speaking, Brooklyn is on Long Island  -- like, it's physically on the island. Long Island University even has a campus in Brooklyn, too. Just don't tell somebody from the borough that they're a Long Islander, because you're likely to get punched in the face for that. Culturally, the two places couldn't be much different. 

It raises an interesting option for the New York Islanders, however, in the wake of the refusal by Nassau County voters on Monday to allow the government to take out bonds to build a new hockey arena for the team.

Could they move to Brooklyn? More specifically, could they move to Barclays Center, the new $800 million building at Atlantic & Flatbush Avenues that the NBA's New Jersey Nets will soon call home? We don't know what Charles Wang will do with his team next -- he could try to sell the team or he could try again to build an arena on the Coliseum site or he could opt for relocation, whether that be in the New York metro or elsewhere.

If selling is his top option, it doesn't appear as though the move to Brooklyn is in the cards. A spokesperson for Nets owner Mikhail Prokhorov told SB Nation's NetsDaily on Tuesday that the eccentric billionaire is not interested in purchasing any other sports teams, eliminating any hope that he could buy the team and put them in his new building.

But if Wang held on to the team and tried to move them to Brooklyn, the Barclays Center itself could be a bit of an obstacle. Nets CEO Brett Yormark released a statement on Tuesday saying the following, via NetsDaily:

"Barclays Center will have an ice rink that can support professional hockey," Yormark said in an email that followed Prokhorov's by minutes. "Due to the venue's design, the capacity for hockey would be several thousand seats less than for basketball. While we hope to explore hockey opportunities in the future, our primary focus at the moment is to build the best sports and entertainment venue in the world."    

Renderings of the new arena do show that it's a bit of an odd specimen, and it doesn't look like it will ever have the ideal set up for hockey. There's going to be a gorgeous new arena in downtown Brooklyn come the late summer and early fall of 2012, but it doesn't appear as though it's an ideal option for the future of the New York Islanders. 

For more on the Isles, be sure to head over to SB Nation's Lighthouse Hockey, where they're all over the depression and the anxiety of Monday's failed vote.