NHL executives have repeatedly said the league is not in expansion mode, nor is it ready to relocate any of its existing teams. But just because it’s not in that mode right this second doesn’t mean it can’t quickly shift into it, and we’re continually seeing chess pieces setting up for the possibility of team movement in the near future.
Owners of new Las Vegas arena ‘highly interested’ in hosting NHL team
One of the key pieces to expanding the NHL to a new city is finding a place for it to play. Check that off the list in Las Vegas.
Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports
One of the places the NHL could potentially call home in a few years is Las Vegas, and we now have an executive from one of the largest companies in that city -- one currently building a brand new arena on the Vegas Strip -- on record discussing the NHL’s potential arrival.
“We would be supportive of an NHL team coming to our arena,” MGM Resorts International executive Dan D’Arrigo told the Las Vegas Review-Journal. “We’re highly interested and we have been in discussions with a group.”
There’s no word on who that “group” -- presumably a potential ownership group -- might be. MGM recently broke ground on a new venue, tentatively called the MGM-AEG Arena, on the Las Vegas Strip. It’s expected to open in time for the 2016-17 NHL season.
AEG, the co-owner of the building, owns the Los Angeles Kings.
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