Ice hockey country
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Ice hockey country (or within North America simply hockey country) is a geographic region of that continent in which ice hockey has the strongest fanbase. The region also produces the vast majority of North American-born players of professional ice hockey, at the National Hockey League (NHL) level.
Ice hockey country mainly consists of areas of North America in which the climate is cold enough that the game can be played. This includes the entirety of Canada, where hockey is immensely popular and is the national wintertime sport. In the United States, the sport's popularity is mostly concentrated in New England and the Upper Midwest, as well as a few Mid-Atlantic states (such as New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania), Alaska, and Colorado. In these states, hockey enjoys great popularity, and most American players in the North American hockey leagues hail from this region. U.S.-born players from outside this region are extremely rare (with the possible exception of California).
Americans from other regions of the United States often dispute the assertion that hockey is a "major" sport, with many refusing to give hockey equal standing with other major professional sports (namely basketball, baseball, and football). It is worth noting however, that the former Confederate States, very much a non-traditional hockey market, have the same number of NHL clubs (six) as Canada, an undisputed hockey hotbed. Moreover, there are an additional three Sunbelt-based clubs in California and a fourth in Arizona. However, since the NHL is the only other team sports league in North America to generate multi-billion dollar revenues, the league is closer financially with the three more popular leagues (the National Basketball Association, Major League Baseball, and the National Football League) than any other North American team sports league. Furthermore, in spite of a season-long lockout in 2004 the NHL returned in 2005 with even stronger revenues than before the lockout.
In the NHL's recent wave of expansion, the league decided to award new teams to cities mainly located in the Sunbelt region. Several teams have also relocated from ice hockey country to more southerly locales: the Minnesota North Stars moved to Texas and became the Dallas Stars, the Winnipeg Jets moved to Phoenix and became the Coyotes, and the Hartford Whalers moved to the North Carolina Research Triangle (and eventually Raleigh), becoming the Carolina Hurricanes. The Quebec Nordiques also moved, but to another part of ice hockey country, rechristening themselves as the Colorado Avalanche.
The NHL is just the top part of the pyramid of North American hockey competitions. The top minor league, the American Hockey League, is primarily concentrated in the northeastern states and provinces, with a handful of teams in the Great Plains and in the southern U.S. The lower-level minor leagues are more widely scattered, being found all over the continent. Somewhat erroneously, while lower-level minor league teams have always thrived in old Rust Belt towns in the Northeast and Midwest (cities such as Flint, Rochester, Wheeling, Toledo, and Johnstown, PA, which was immortalized in the film Slap Shot), many ECHL and Central Hockey League teams in the South and Southwest are enormously successful, such as teams in Austin and Laredo, Texas.
The elite Junior hockey clubs tend to be concentrated in Quebec, Ontario, Western Canada, New England, the midwestern United States, and the Pacific Northwest. College hockey is most popular in the northeast, midwest and upper midwest regions of the United States, as well as Colorado and Alaska. College players come in roughly equal numbers from the US and Canada, with a smattering of Europeans. Canadian college hockey is considered to be at a slightly lower level than that played south of the border.
"Hockey country" is also a marketing term used by the National Hockey League's Ottawa Senators and the Canadian Hockey League's Ottawa 67's to describe the geographic region of Eastern Ontario and Western Quebec. Likewise, hockey's great popularity in Minnesota has led some to dub it "The State of Hockey," and the United States Hockey Hall of Fame,is located in Eveleth, Minnesota (not to be confused with the more famous Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto). The phrase "The State of Hockey" as name which became the slogan of the Minnesota Wild when they joined the NHL in 2000. In the same vein, the Detroit Red Wings have promoted Detroit as "Hockeytown, USA," and the Edmonton Oilers billed their home region as "the Heartland of Hockey".
