Jets moving farm team to Winnipeg a big plus for organization’s young players

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This article was published 13/03/2015 (3858 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A draft-and-develop franchise gets the opportunity to crank up its developing with Thursday’s approval for the Winnipeg Jets to bring their AHL franchise back to the MTS Centre, Jets GM Kevin Cheveldayoff said.

The AHL’s board of governors granted that request, to relocate the team from St. John’s, N.L., starting this fall, and also the move of the Hamilton Bulldogs, the affiliate team of the Montreal Canadiens, to fill the void in St. John’s, items reported in last Saturday’s Free Press.

“We’re about taking these young players through the draft, through development, to be integral parts of our team,” Cheveldayoff told reporters on a conference call from Vancouver. “Where else are there better opportunities to show them what Winnipeg is all about and what being a Winnipegger is, the culture of our city and the passion of our fans, than having them come here and do it right at home.

“Having the ability to have them close by, to be able to watch them, to know that… (Jets coach) Paul Maurice might be sitting in the stands watching them that night, again, those things are so, so important.”

True North Sports & Entertainment, which owns the NHL’s Jets and AHL’s IceCaps, has experience in moving franchises, having moved two in one summer in 2011.

Another move of the AHL franchise might be in the offing, but Cheveldayoff said Thursday the farm team will be here for more than one season.

In January 2014, True North executive chairman Mark Chipman confirmed the Jets were looking for a better geographical fit for their AHL team. The group in St. John’s knew that as an eventuality in 2011 but were granted a second one-year extension of their deal last September, a concession by True North to help them find another NHL affiliate.

True North still has interest in a project being proposed in Thunder Bay, Ont., for a 5,700-seat facility, but it has not been green-lighted and won’t be ready before late 2017, if at all.

“We’ve looked at a lot of different cities,” Cheveldayoff said. “I’ve personally visited a lot of different cities trying to see if there’s a match.

“The conversation always turned back to, ‘What about Winnipeg?’ “

Cheveldayoff wouldn’t say whether the returned AHL team will again be known as the Manitoba Moose, which operated in Winnipeg between 1996 and 2011.

“We’re not making any commitments from a brand standpoint,” he said. “We’ll have a big splash when we do get rolled out.”

Already, True North has begun a five-year project for as much as $30 million worth of improvements and updates to the MTS Centre. Now, additional facilities to house the AHL team will need to be constructed by fall in the arena’s bowels.

The housing of two teams in one facility isn’t unprecedented.

It happens frequently between NHL and NBA teams and it’s also taking place in Calgary and Edmonton, where NHL clubs share a rink with WHL teams.

The NHL’s San Jose Sharks are also moving their AHL team to their own arena, the SAP Center, for this fall.

Thursday’s news for the Jets, though, was about a better scenario for its NHL prospects.

“The simple part is the logistics of it,” Cheveldayoff said. “In the AHL everyone talks about the schedule and the practice time and the balance between the two. We’ve made no secret about it (that) we’ve been looking to find a solution to an AHL situation that would be something we’d be comfortable with for the short term and the long term.

“Being able to balance the practice time and the lead time we need for a call-up and just the sheer travel distance between St. John’s and Winnipeg was something that we went through, and it was something we wanted to address sooner than later.”

Thursday’s approvals by the AHL included the go-ahead for the Canadiens to buy their AHL affiliate from owner Michael Andlauer at the end of this season.

Andlauer, who owns a minor share of the Canadiens, has in turn purchased the major-junior Belleville Bulls of the OHL and has approval to relocate that team to Hamilton this fall. Junior hockey returns to the city for the first time since 1991, and Andlauer will rename the team Bulldogs, retaining his brand and organization there at FirstOntario Centre, formerly Copps Coliseum.

It was Andlauer’s moves that started the dominoes falling, moves that suited the Jets well, given their known interest to decamp from St. John’s.

tim.campbell@freepress.mb.ca