Two major cities surface as alleged favorites for NHL expansion

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Axel Williams
September 8, 2024 (3:08 PM)

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Throughout the last decade or so, the NHL has expanded to Las Vegas and Seattle with great levels of success.

The Las Vegas Golden Knights are already Stanley Cup champions, while the Kraken has been set up for a decent future. With this success in mind, the league has confirmed that it is already considering the possibility of another expansion. Essentially, the league would want to expand to 34 teams, which is pretty ambitious considering no other major sport has that many franchises.

According to super agent Allan Walsh, the NHL has decided on two major cities that it would love to expand to. In fact, these two cities have been mentioned plenty of times before.

These cities are Houston and Atlanta. This would allow for one more team in the East and one more team in the West. However, it should be noted that the league has tried Atlanta two times before with the Flames and the Thrashers. These franchises never panned out, so who knows if the National Hockey League would be smart to attempt a comeback.

As for Quebec City, you might be waiting a long time for that one to pan out. NHL commissioner Gary Bettman doesn't care very much for Canada as an expansion target. Moreover, Quebec isn't exactly a big market for professional sports. The only sport they would ever be able to handle is hockey, which is a bit of a problem.

Do you believe the NHL should continue its expansion efforts? Let us know in the poll down below and stay tuned to Hockey Unplugged for the latest news and updates from around the hockey world.