NHL adding 4 teams- including Las Vegas and Seattle?

[TTX]

I'd go with Silver Knights but should be fun regardless.

[Vegas]

Sept 15, 2016 10:32:25 GMT -5 TTX said:

I'd go with Silver Knights but should be fun regardless.

if not the Silver Knights (it would make sense since Nevada is the Silver State) then hopefully at least the Desert Knights.

I don't like the other possibility of Golden Knights and I am glad they are no longer considering the Black Knights. I thought the Black Aces would have been a really cool name, but the name Black Knights belongs to the US Military.

I also thought it was cool to read the team will incorporate the local Red Rock color into their uniforms.

Meanwhile construction started this week on the new NHL team's headquarters and practice facility which is located just a few minutes away on my street Sahara across from Downtown Summerlin next to the Red Rock casino. Upstairs in the facility they will have a MacKenzie River Pizza, Grill & Pub with views of both ice rinks so fans can have a great meal and a couple of beers while watching their NHL team practice.

[Sinclair Promotions]

Las Vegas franchise reaches limit on season tickets
Capped at 16,000; drive began in February 2015 with initial goal of 10,000 deposits
NHL.com September 19th, 2016

The Las Vegas NHL franchise has received deposits on all 16,000 season tickets available for the 2017-18 season.

Fans are still able to place deposits on season tickets, which will be fulfilled as they become available. A limited number of game-day tickets will also be made available before the team begins play next season.

"Today, we are proud to announce that season tickets for the 2017 season are sold out," owner Bill Foley said. "This is a truly historic event for the Las Vegas community, the NHL and all of our fans. I would like to thank everyone who has supported and continues to support our efforts to make the Las Vegas NHL franchise a success."

The season-ticket drive began in February 2015 with an initial goal of 10,000 deposits. More than 5,000 tickets were sold within two days and 9,000 season tickets were sold within a month of the launch, according to the franchise.

"We launched a season-ticket drive to demonstrate the long-term viability of an NHL franchise in Las Vegas and were able to surpass our initial goal within months." Foley said.

The Las Vegas franchise will play at T-Mobile Arena, which currently has a seating capacity of 17,500 for hockey games.

In mid-October, around the start of the regular season, Foley said he hopes to announce the name, logo and color scheme, and sell merchandise such as hats and T-shirts. Jerseys probably won't go on sale until December.

Las Vegas was awarded the 31st NHL franchise on June 22, 2016, the League's first expansion team since the Columbus Blue Jackets and Minnesota Wild began play in the 2000-01 season. The NHL is the first of the four major North American professional sports leagues to put a team in the city.

[Sinclair Promotions]

I have to say that the season ticket sales are a great starting point for the Vegas Franchise.

If they can keep that number up year after year the franchise will quickly jump into one of the top earner spots among NHL Franchises.

Hopefully the fans don't turn into "Fair Weather Fans" who only come out if the team is successful. Which is hurting teams like Florida, Tampa Bay & Carolina to name a couple.

[Vegas]

unfortunately now it appears the new Las Vegas NHL team's name won't be finalized and announced until early November:

Announcement of Las Vegas NHL team name delayed again

Owner Bill Foley said Thursday the final design on the Las Vegas NHL expansion team’s logo and the color scheme will be used on the uniforms still has not been finalized. Foley said the unveiling of the name “Las Vegas (blank) Knights” might wait until early November.

Foley said earlier this month that “Knights” will be part of the team name and it would be either the Silver Knights, Desert Knights or Golden Knights.

“We had a webinar (Thursday) with adidas and the NHL and we’re still tweaking the logo and the use of the colors,” Foley said. “It probably means we’re going to have to push back the big announcement because it’s going to take time to get everything printed on the shirts and hats. The jerseys will take a little longer to produce.”

Foley initially was hoping for an announcement to coincide with the first-ever NHL games at T-Mobile Arena on Oct. 7-8. But when the name, logo and colors were still in progress, the date became late October. Now, that that time frame is unlikely.


“The other issue is Toshiba Plaza,” Foley said. “We want to do the unveiling there. But there are very few open dates in October because the arena is being used most of the month. It’s a little more open in November.”

Foley said the team and adidas are meeting again early next week in the hopes of finalizing the look of the logo and the use of the colors. The NHL has to give its approval once the name, logo and colors are officially submitted for use.

“We’re getting real close,” he said. “But we want it to be perfect.”

[Sinclair Promotions]

NHL LAS VEGAS TEAM CHOOSES NAME,
OWNER DENISE FLOATING FAKES
Josh Cooper
October 4th, 2016
Yahoo.com

Las Vegas NHL owner Bill Foley has decided on a team name.

“We have registered the three names related to Knights,” Foley said. “(They’re) Desert Knights, Silver Knights and Golden Knights and we have clearance on those names and we picked one of them.”

When asked to give some clues on which one of those three he picked, Foley chuckled and said, “I can tell you it’s going to be one of those three names.”

The holdup now has to do with the team’s color scheme and how Foley’s vision will look on a jersey. Foley hopes that the team will have an announcement in early-to-mid November.

“We settled on the name about 45 days ago, maybe even a bit more than that. So then it was just refining the logo and refining the color scheme that goes around that logo. We’ve had five different webinars with Adidas and the League, kind of looking at the colors and how they work together,” Foley said. “I’m really trying to develop a powerful color scheme that our guys will feel great about wearing and they’ll feel strong. I just want it to reflect kind of the culture of the team and that’s probably why it’s taking longer. I’m probably the hang-up. Just trying to get it as close to perfect as I can.”

Foley wouldn’t give further details on the colors, other than saying he wants them to “signify strength, the strength of character, power and colors we can build a culture of ‘never give up, never give in, always go forward, always advance.’”

Added Foley, “We also want to get some colors that have a relationship to Las Vegas so we’re trying to work that in, so it has been a process. It has been interesting but it has been a real process.”

The naming process has involved several different reported possibilities from variations on the word ‘Hawk’ to the ‘Knights’ template. The billionaire businessman said that he had not pushed fake names as a misdirection ploy. In an early September piece, he was quoted as saying he had floated false name possibilities.

“I’ve had fun on the name, but I never floated a fake name,” Foley said. “I don’t know where that came from. What we did is we registered a number of different names. We registered some names dealing with ‘Hawk’ because for a period of time I thought, ‘Boy, Nighthawks that sounds kind of interesting’ and Desert Hawks. Then we started moving on to a name associated with Knights so we kind of went beyond the Hawks names.”

Foley pointed out he has needed to be more careful as this journey to name the team has reached a critical point.

“It’s really getting the names trademarked and trade named and getting them trademarked and trade named not just for hockey but also for apparel. That’s been the big thing we’ve been working on. That’s what we’ve been trying to be very closed-mouthed about what the name is going to be because as soon as I kind of indicated it might be X, Y or Z everyone went out and was trying to register the names, register the domain names, they were trying to come up with color schemes and register them. I just learned I had to be careful. I just underestimated how many people are out there watching this and trying to grab the name.”

Originally, the hope was that the Las Vegas franchise could unveil the name in early October, but Foley is OK with the delay. For him, getting the name, colors and logo right is more important than getting them done as quickly as possible.

“I want this to be serious,” Foley said. “I want to build a culture around this name.”

SOURCE

[Sinclair Promotions]

Las Vegas franchise expects to win quickly
Owner, general manager believe expansion draft will make team competitive immediately
October 8th, 2016
NHL.com Article

LAS VEGAS -- The first question was about, of course, the name.

Bill Foley, the owner of the Las Vegas expansion franchise that will join the NHL next season, sat on stage with George McPhee, his general manager, at Toshiba Plaza outside T-Mobile Arena on Saturday before the Los Angeles Kings played the Colorado Avalanche in a preseason game.

Fans had been listening to music, playing street hockey and getting autographs from former NHL players. Now they lined up along a fence to ask questions about Las Vegas' first major-league professional sports franchise.

"When can we really expect the team name?" the first fan asked.

Foley smiled. He knew it was coming. He said the name and logo had been picked and the team colors were "probably about four or five days away" from being finalized.

"I think George knows the name," Foley joked. "I'm not sure if George even knows."

"I know the name, but I haven't told my wife," McPhee told the fans. "I haven't told my kids. So I'm not telling you. If you don't tell anybody, you never have to worry about it."

Foley has said the team will be called the Desert, Silver or Golden Knights, and the colors will include gray, gold and a red-rock hue from the Nevada landscape. But he wants everything to be just right, and he wants merchandise ready for the announcement. He said the team was shooting for Nov. 18 to hold an event at Toshiba Plaza.

"Our goal is really to … have a logo and a name that gives us the ability to create a culture around this team that will be built here for years and years and years to come," Foley said. "If anything, that's why I've been a little bit [particular] about this, kind of waiting and waiting and trying to refine and refine. So I appreciate everyone's patience. We're very close."

The rest of the questions covered all kinds of topics, from whether the team will be on local TV (yes), to whether practices will be open at the new facility being built (yes), to whether the team would be open to an outdoor game (of course), to when a youth hockey program will start (next fall), to when games will be scheduled considering the unusual shifts of many workers in town.

Foley said T-Mobile Arena already had reserved many Saturday and Sunday dates that would be "convenient to local Vegas residents" -- and maybe, well, inconvenient to opposing teams.

"We don't mind having Sunday afternoon games," Foley said, smiling, "because if the guys come in on Saturday night at 2 a.m. and they might go out and they might stay out a little late and then we play at 1 in the afternoon … I can see a very strong home record here. Very strong."

Fans also dug into how this team will be built. What is McPhee's philosophy? When will he hire a coach? How will he handle the expansion and entry drafts? Will Las Vegas have its own American Hockey League affiliate?

"You have speed and skill, and you have size and you have grit, and you have character and leadership," McPhee said. "So we're going to just build the best darn team we can build and have all those elements, because ultimately to be able to win, you have to be able to beat a bunch of good teams that play different styles."

McPhee said he planned to hire a coach in the spring, when more candidates would become available, and to take the best players available in the expansion draft.

"Ideally you want a younger team to work with, but we're going to take the most valuable assets that we can get, because if they can't play for us, they can play for someone else and we can turn those into even more assets," McPhee said. "Looking forward to it. It's going to be quite a process. We're going to end up with a real nice hockey club from the expansion draft, and then we're going to build through the entry draft."

Foley said Las Vegas would be No. 3 in the draft lottery. Odds are, it will stay at No. 3, but it could drop as low as No. 6 or rise as high as No. 1.

"We're pretty lucky here in Las Vegas," Foley said, smiling. "I've got a feeling we'll be No. 1."

No rush on an AHL team.

"Most of our prospects will still be at the junior and college level, so there's really no need to fill out an entire team," McPhee said. "We'll have six or eight guys that we can call up if we get banged up. But we'll share for a couple years and then we'll hone in on a place and see if we can have our own club."

Foley and McPhee continued to make one thing clear: They want to win the Stanley Cup, and they want to do it quickly. They feel Las Vegas will be a favored destination for players.

"I think they're going to love it here," McPhee said. "Why wouldn't you want to come here? Seriously. Why wouldn't you want to live here?"

The fans cheered.

"It's a fantastic place to live and work," McPhee continued. "Whether you want to live down here on The Strip or live out in the suburbs, there are great places to live. We have great facilities, great ownership. Easy to get around. Lovely people in this community. Really, really nice people here.

"So I think it's going to be a fantastic place to play, and our objective is to win quickly and to ultimately win the Stanley Cup. Players will go anywhere if it's a good team to win a Cup, and they're certainly going to want to come here, because it's better than a lot of places."