The New York Islanders are going nowhere.
After years of hard work, debate, local and geopolitical battles by the Isles brass, and owner Charles Wang; New York will keep it's Islanders in the Big Apple for a very, very long time.
Today it was announced that the Islanders will move to the Barclay's Center in Brooklyn, NY when their lease at Nassau Coliseum ends after the 2014-2015 season.
The new lease in Brooklyn runs for 25 years beginning in the fall of 2015.
The Coliseum, which has been open in Hempstead since 1972, has become the NHL's biggest dump. Falling apart at the seams, and serving as a virtual wasteland for hockey with a hockey team that has failed to grab the headlines from the Devils and Rangers over the past 20 plus years, it is easy to forget that the Islanders are part of the New York landscape.
And this is a franchise that won four Stanley Cup titles back in the 1980's, and ruled this town the way the Rangers, and even the Devils never have.
After Nassau County voters TKO'd a proposal by Wang to build a new arena and shopping mall at the site of the old building, it looked more and more likely that New York would lose its Islanders to either a Canadian city, or even Kansas City, Mo.
Yet, Wang hung tight. He kept looking and hoping for a deal and finally got it with the Barclays Center in Brooklyn. While the new Nets arena is not hockey ready at this point, with no locker rooms for hockey, and with the prospects of a very odd seating chart for hockey (people in front will be positioned in a U shape around the rink on the floor), it is tens times better than the unknown.
Wang even said in his interview on air with WFAN's Mike Francesa that is was Brooklyn or bust for the Islanders, which has to give Islander fans pause in knowing that they were this close to losing the team to another town. Thankfully for fans on Long Island, Queens and Brooklyn they will keep their Isles in town. Now, maybe the front can focus on resurrecting the franchise.
Today it was announced that the Islanders will move to the Barclay's Center in Brooklyn, NY when their lease at Nassau Coliseum ends after the 2014-2015 season.
The new lease in Brooklyn runs for 25 years beginning in the fall of 2015.
The Coliseum, which has been open in Hempstead since 1972, has become the NHL's biggest dump. Falling apart at the seams, and serving as a virtual wasteland for hockey with a hockey team that has failed to grab the headlines from the Devils and Rangers over the past 20 plus years, it is easy to forget that the Islanders are part of the New York landscape.
And this is a franchise that won four Stanley Cup titles back in the 1980's, and ruled this town the way the Rangers, and even the Devils never have.
Yet, Wang hung tight. He kept looking and hoping for a deal and finally got it with the Barclays Center in Brooklyn. While the new Nets arena is not hockey ready at this point, with no locker rooms for hockey, and with the prospects of a very odd seating chart for hockey (people in front will be positioned in a U shape around the rink on the floor), it is tens times better than the unknown.
Wang even said in his interview on air with WFAN's Mike Francesa that is was Brooklyn or bust for the Islanders, which has to give Islander fans pause in knowing that they were this close to losing the team to another town. Thankfully for fans on Long Island, Queens and Brooklyn they will keep their Isles in town. Now, maybe the front can focus on resurrecting the franchise.
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