There won’t be any NHL Hockey anytime soon but for one of its downtrodden franchises, there is light at the end of the tunnel. In a stunning announcement, the New York Islanders are moving from their home of the past 40 years, the Nassau Coliseum, to Brooklyn at the brand new state of the art Barclay’s Center beginning in 2015-16 seasons. Owner Charles Wang, who for years has tried to get a new deal and keep the team on Long Island, was running out of options. The Barclays deal took seven months to complete and was finished Tuesday night, according to Wang, who said he had wanted to keep the team local.
”Brooklyn is big time and now we have the big-league sports to prove it,” Mayor Michael Bloomberg said.
The possibility exist to move the team out of New York all together one rumored destination was Kansas City. For the borough of Brooklyn this mark another coup, first the Nets come to Brooklyn and now the Islanders. Wang stated in an interview with WFAN’s Mike Francesa, that the team will keep the name, the history and the logo in the move to Brooklyn. So the Islanders will still be the New York Islanders. The move to Brooklyn will help in marketing a better product on the ice and will go a long way to attracting big name free agents. The fans as expected had a mixed reaction, especially the fans that lived closer to the Coliseum. Many of them enjoyed a short drive maybe even walked to the Coliseum to see Islander games. Now after 2015 that will no longer be the case. The big losers in this are of course Nassau County and its citizens. This move means a loss of thousands of jobs just in the Coliseum alone. Not to mention the businesses in the immediate area around the arena, that feed off events that come there, not just hockey. As the announcement was made many people that live in Nassau County complained about the team leaving. The County is broke and struggles to keep its police force in tact so where would there be money to keep a hockey team? Don’t forget, this was put before a vote and the County voted not to finance a new Coliseum if it might higher taxes than what they already pay now. So the loss will be felt for quite some time. When the lease expires on the Coliseum in 2014, the most likely scenario is the Coliseum will be no more, it will be gone, what will be put in its place is open to much debate, will it be another shopping mail? Maybe housing in the form of condos or town houses? Regardless what rises in its place, one thing is certain, and it will no longer be the home of the NHL’s 4 time Stanley Cup Champion New York Islanders. For Islander fans who are bemoaning the team’s move to Brooklyn, consider this: the team is still in the New York Metro area and only a train ride away (LIRR) and not a plane ride away to somewhere like Kansas City. This is not the Dodgers and Giants leaving New York altogether. This is not the machinations of an owner trying to get greedy. Charles Wang put up a lot of his own money to try to keep the team on Long Island. Every sports team in New York has had an upgrade in stadium or arena improvements or new stadiums altogether. The Mets (Citi field)The Yankees(New Yankee Stadium across the street from the old one)Jets and Giants (MetLife Stadium) the Knicks, and Rangers are getting major face lift at Madison Square Garden the Devils moved to Downtown Newark to a New arena . So only the Islanders were asked to continue to play in an arena with no improvements with any future improvements in sight because the citizens there are already mortgaged with the highest taxes in the state of New York.
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