The FHL will be expanding into St. Clair Shores Michigan for the 2016-2017 season. Busy area, lot of money, will probably do well.
Any other expansion team news for the FHL?
The league that won't die just keeps on giving!
I just realized something. This starving artist league now has 8 teams. The better laid out SPHL has 10 teams this season.
I would not say 8 teams makes a league starving besides things can change very fast the Southern league could have 6 teams next year.
Comparing the Single A SPHL to the FHL is not comparing apples to apples. St. Claire Shores may have 1,ooo seats. The FHL needs to add more teams/arena's like Port Huron, Dayton (at least their arena), and Danbury before being spoken on a par with the SPHL IMO.
To the best fans in hockey,
I would like to take this opportunity to thank the players, corporate sponsors, booster club, season ticket holders and fans for making my arrival in Dayton a memorable one.
We turned a bad season into a great season with the help of Brett Wall, Teresa
Woodhouse, Sandy Shiverdecker, Dylan Kuhn, Tim King and Leah Cowgill. From everyone in the front office to the off*ice officials and Hara Arena staff everything was first class.
Dayton hockey has been an ongoing project of mine since the spring of 2015, I planned on being in Dayton last summer to create a winning atmosphere between Hara Arena, the team, fans, local communities and businesses. Unfortunately for reasons out of my control the membership was awarded to an ownership group from East Coast United States. This started what turned out to be a bad experience for the players, fans, corporate sponsors and our home Hara Arena.
As soon as the franchise became available I jumped at the opportunity to purchase the team. I purchased the team from the league for the love of the game. I couldn't have been happier that it was in Dayton where I feel they had the best fans and arena in the league where the opportunity to get involved was a dream come true.
My role as the Owner and Head Coach was to turn the organization, players and atmosphere around as fast as possible. I had no idea how bad things were until I arrived in Dayton and began to field phone calls on an hourly and daily basis from unhappy corporate sponsors, season ticket holders and purveyors.
I never diverted from my goal of turning this organization around and running a first class team from top to bottom. I want to personally thank everyone that supported the team and myself through the ups and downs of the transition period and the dream of making the playoffs, which the boys did.
I came to Dayton to run a professional hockey team for not only this year but for years to come. Unfortunately due to circumstances out of my control Hara Arena is unable to sign leases not only to myself but to other tenants.
At this time I regret to announce that Dayton Professional Hockey will be going dormant for the 2016-2017 season due to arena availability and lack of lead up time.
Like I told my players we never say never, I will be eagerly pursuing to find a location to house our professional hockey team in the Dayton area if Hara Arena is not available for the 2017 * 2018 season.
Yours in Hockey,
Coach Joe Pace Sr.
For any questions please contact Joe Pace Sr. at [email protected] or 708-205-000.
Pace is not Soskin. Barry Soskin owned the Dayton team that moved to Port Huron.
Dayton being freed up from the FHL really opens the door to some leagues to snatch up the market. I doubt that the ECHL will take another stab, but the SPHL was rumored to have interest there as they slowly push their footprint north. And if the fans there would accept a junior league, it falls nicely into the footprint of both the USHL and NAHL.
I imagine Brewster will be folding given their average attendance of 243 for the season...
This league keeps multiplying!
At least they are following the proper order of math functions. Get the multiplication out of the way before you subtract.