Captain Shane Doan of the Coyotes, who take on the Senators tonight in Glendale, says players have become callous to arena news but they remain optimistic.
The forward lines had been tweaked and goalie Louis Domingue debuted a new set of red pads, but other than that, it appeared not much had changed for the Coyotes when they reconvened at Gila River Arena on Wednesday for practice after a two-day break from the ice.
Except, of course, the spotlight on their arena situation.
That’s become magnified in recent days after NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman sent a three-page letter to Arizona legislature leaders Tuesday encouraging them to pass a public-financing bill for a new arena in downtown Phoenix or the East Valley.
Majority team owner Andrew Barroway also released a statement, explaining that the Coyotes can’t survive in Glendale and team owners are losing tens of millions of dollars annually. If the franchise reaches a point “where there is simply no longer a path forward in Arizona,” Barroway said, then the organization “will work with our partners in the League office and across the NHL to determine our next steps.”
Coach Dave Tippett said he didn’t address the topic with the team Wednesday, nor did anyone bring it up with him.
After getting dropped into bankruptcy in 2009, the franchise was commissioned a ward of the league until the current ownership group purchased the club in 2013.
Two years later, the city of Glendale nixed a 15-year, $225 million arena management agreement with the team and, while the Coyotes have continued to play out of Gila River Arena after negotiating a two-year deal and re-upping for next season, they’ve been in search of another location in the Valley to permanently call home.
“I truly don’t even know what to say in the fact that we make it hard to be a Coyotes fan at times, and we sure appreciate the fans that stick with us because it’s difficult and it’s because of a whole bunch of things,” captain Shane Doan said.
Earlier this year, Arizona State pulled out of a plan to potentially house the team in Tempe. Mesa’s Sloan Park, which is the spring-training home of the Chicago Cubs, has been mentioned as another possible landing spot. All the while, a bill that would create a funding model for a new facility has awaited a vote in the Senate with leadership telling The Republic it likely does not have the votes to pass.
While Wednesday was business as usual on the ice for the Coyotes, who return to action Thursday when they host the Senators, Doan said there’s no way players don’t hear what’s going on with the arena.
“You’ve grown so callous to it now that it is what it is,” Doan said. “But you recognize how you end up in this situation where we’re more worried about survival than we are building the brand and building the franchise. You hope that at some point we can get to the right side and start building the brand and building the franchise, and it’d be exciting to see how great it could be.”
And Doan believes the team will have that chance in Arizona.
“By no means is this anything that we haven’t (gone through) in the past,” he said. “It is what it is, and there’s always hope that it all gets worked out and (I) continue to be an optimist.”