With the arrival of pumpkin and cinnamon comes pucks and sticks; that’s right, hockey season is back! As a a Georgian hockey fan, sometimes I find myself disappointed at our lack of participation in the National Hockey League (NHL). However, it was not always this way.
Atlanta’s first professional hockey team was the Atlanta Flames, established in 1972. The team took home ice at the Omni Coliseum—what we now know as the CNN center. The Atlanta Flames help introduce professional hockey to the southeast, making an impact during their short time.
Although the Flames were successful, making it to the playoffs six out of their eight seasons, the team’s time in Atlanta came to an end in 1980. Due to low attendance and financial difficulties, the franchise was sold to Calgary and is still active today.
Seventeen years later in 1997, the NHL granted its 28th franchise to Atlanta and the Thrashers played their first game in 1999. The Thrashers played at Philips Arena, now State Farm Arena.
Although they lasted in Atlanta a bit longer than the Flames, the Thrashers were not as successful in the league and only made it to the playoffs once in 2007.
Similar to Flames, the Thrashers were sold to a Canadian group and relocated to Winnipeg in 2011. Rebranded as the Winnipeg Jets, the team is still active today.
Despite Atlanta’s rocky past in the NHL, the Atlanta Gladiators of the ECHL have been going strong for almost a decade. The Gladiators are a professional team based in Duluth, feeding into the Nashville Predators and previously the Arizona Coyotes organizations as their ECHL affiliate.
No matter where you stand on a fan basis, everyone can have fun watching the fast-paced, electrifying game. The first NHL game of the regular season will take place on October 4th with the Global Series in Prague. If you weren’t into hockey before, let this be the year you give it a try. You might end up like me, and accidentally fall in love with it!
