Midwestern Movement Coming For SPHL

With the purchase of the Peoria Rivermen, the Vancouver Canucks wasted no time in saying they wouldn't be using Peoria as their AHL base, leaving the area without a team and the Canucks looking for an AHL locale. However, with Peoria as a free agent, a market like that won't be without a minor league team for long....and they aren't. 

It was announced that Peoria, who will use the name Rivermen-- a copy-written name of the city, and the Central Hockey League's Bloomington Blaze will join up with the "Single-A" Southern Professional Hockey League. Yes, two teams from Illinois will be joining the SOUTHERN Pro League for the 2013-14 season. 

Of course, those not familiar with the SPHL can check out the "Better Know" piece I did as the NHL lockout happened. The odd part about this is not that both teams will be owned by the same people, but that these teams in the Midwest are looking at the SPHL as an option and hope that it could form a Midwest exile from the Central League, in hopes that Quad Cities, St. Charles, and other Midwest CHL teams will be disgruntled by the way the CHL is run and move over to that side of things. 

The branching out of the SPHL is something that is good for the league perception, but at the same time-- if the finances of a "Double-A" league is in doubt when it comes to including a team from Brampton, Ontario; you can bet that the SPHL, a much smaller financed league, will have some teams be in possible trouble with the inclusion of more further travel. 

(Unrelated, the Augusta Riverhawks won't play next season due to arena lease issues they have had.)

Whether or not this brings in more Midwest teams or expands the league or just alienates their founding franchises and the SPHL slowly turns into another Midwest based league like the United Hockey League or International Hockey League will remain to be seen. There's good ideas and bad ideas when it comes to all of this, but if nothing else; it shows a market like Peoria will go to anywhere to keep their team tradition alive and well, even if it does mean travelling through the Southeastern US. 

Brampton to the CHL...No, the OTHER CHL

Image via Central Hockey League

Word on Wednesday was that the Central Hockey League had reached an agreement with owners in Brampton, Ontario to bring a CHL team to the Brampton area. Brampton had recently lost their Major Junior team to North Bay, Ontario for next season; but a group stepped up and will have another league to add to the Greater Toronto Area.

This should set off red flags all around, however.

The Central League is one that actually had some geographic setting when it started, playing in the middle of the US, starting in Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Mississippi. While they did branch out to other states bordering the area (New Mexico, Arizona, Georgia), they always went really far east in North Carolina, Tennessee, and even going so far as Youngstown, Ohio for a crazy three season road trip for some teams and for the old team itself.

While they have taken over most of the midwest market by absorbing the old United Hockey League territories in Illinois and Indiana, the travel doesn't seem to be too much of some teams financially, but Brampton could be the next Youngstown of the league. The closest team to the new Brampton team would be the Bloomington Blaze, who are a 10-hour trek away according to Stadium Journey. This would also mean a lot of travel for not only the Brampton team, but also the teams they have to play who have to find a way to deal with the travel up there and coming with the finances to make those trips work and still have enough to operate during the rest of the season.

The idea of actually have a wider brand reach for the Central League is smart, but the it's a matter of whether or not fans will turn out for low-AA hockey or not that will make the Brampton team successful, which is another issue on top of travel for the team. Is getting the exposure to the Canadian side of things worth alienating or hurting the league's other teams?? Or is this something the CHL has though of and talked about with their member teams in order to figure out whether or not it was a viable option or not.

Of course, the fact of the matter is the former of that last statement is probably more accurate. If a new expansion team is going to bring in some money in fees and spread it out across the league-- odds are people would be agreeing with it even if they personally don't like it. It'd help the health of the league for the short-term, but the long-term viability could be dicey at best, especially for a team like the Rapid City (SD) Rush.

The upside is that the further markets-- Denver and Arizona-- are near some international airports, so it's not like they couldn't a flight-- but at the same time, that would be much more costly for them. Whether or not the addition of Brampton and St. Charles, Missouri will break up the CHL into two six-team conferences and break-up travel for the Western teams, but it could be a brief concern for the people in charge.

Canada is hockey crazy for the most part, but whether or not they'll be accepting of a lower minor league over a junior team or higher minor league remains to be seen. It's good to see that the CHL is trying to expand themselves and leave their mark on the hockey landscape, but they already had one misstep in going too far east with teams in the past-- who knows if they can afford to have another.