DOUBLE-CHECK THAT YOU’VE GOT THE MONEY
While the Knights have been formally granted a team, they haven’t technically made their final payment to the league. That comes early next year and should be a formality. After all, what kind of expansion team would agree to join the NHL before it knew it had its finances sorted out?
Well, about that. As it turns out, the league has a history of expansion teams failing to come up with the cash they’d promised. It happened back in 1952, when the Original Six-era NHL considered adding a seventh team. That was supposed to be the Cleveland Barons, who’d move up from the AHL. They just needed to come up with the money, reported at the time to be about half a million dollars. They never did, the NHL rescinded its offer, and the league didn’t expand for another 15 years.
History repeated itself in 1974, when the NHL awarded a team to Seattle for the 1976-77 season. The ownership group spent the next year missing payment deadlines, and by the 1975 off-season the league had had enough. It pulled the plug, and we’re still talking about Seattle expansion more than four decades later.
So be careful, Golden Knights. Not that anyone’s ever made any bad decisions with their cash in Las Vegas, but remember: the NHL loves its expansion teams…right up until they miss a payment or two.