Current Owner Curt Styres to get Halifax Expansion Team.
By InsideLacrosse.com
There could be another shakeup coming to the National Lacrosse League.
According to multiple league sources, the long-awaited Halifax team will be brought into the fold from an unlikely place — a current league owner.
IL Indoor has heard that Curt Styres, the current owner of the NLL East Division champion Rochester Knighthawks, is planning on selling the team to Pegula Sports and Entertainment, which owns the NLL’s Buffalo Bandits and other professional teams.
Styres would then take control of an expansion team in Halifax. According to sources, it is allowable for an owner to control more than one club.
This would also pave the way for San Diego Seals owner Joseph Tsai to bring an NLL team to Long Island. Tsai recently took majority ownership of the NBA’s Brooklyn Nets, so an additional NLL team in New York would make plenty of sense under his ownership.
The status of the NHL’s New York Islanders getting a new arena could impact the viability of that New York team, since the initial discussions involved the vacant Nassau Coliseum.
Regardless of that status, the Pegulas would become the first current ownership group to have control of two franchises with the Bandits and Knighthawks.
When Buffalo News reporter Jack Goods reached out to the Bandits, director of lacrosse operations Scott Loffler said “Other than congratulating the Knighthawks on a great season and commending Curt on becoming one of the best owners in the NLL, there’s nothing else for us to say about Rochester.”
The possibility of the NLL adding a team in Halifax was originally reported on July 1, 2017 along with the additions of San Diego and Philadelphia, which join the NLL for the 2018-2019 season. Halifax was delayed for multiple reasons, including the need for stable ownership.
According to reports in October 2017, there was a distinct possibility of Halifax joining in time for 2018-2019, but the deadline passed with no traction, once again due to the lack of an ownership situation the league was comfortable with.
Styres certainly fits the bill as an elite owner in the NLL. According to two sources, he initially intended on moving the Knighthawks to Nova Scotia, but the league wanted to keep them in Rochester — as opposed to granting a new expansion team for the city — and is allowing Styres to instead develop a new team in Halifax.
Halifax has long been a fixture of NLL rumors, with commissioner Nick Sakiewicz visiting the Nova Scotia town in the past. In a June 13 story in the Saskatoon Star Phoenix, he explicitly mentions Halifax.
“We’re very focused on the NHL/NBA model, because those guys own arenas and it’s a natural fit,” he said. “But there’s a lot of markets we’re looking at where it’s not necessarily an NHL team. Halifax is a good example. We think Halifax is going to be a tremendous market. We’ve met with the mayor there, and we’re trying to identify ownership to take advantage of it. Halifax feels like a market that could be like (Saskatoon), with an independent owner. We continue to look for the right group, and I emphasize ‘right group.’ We’re not bringing teams into this league like we did in the past; we’re not bringing owners into this league like we did in the past. They’ve got to qualify for some pretty high standards.”
According to an Inside Lacrosse report in March, the league registered for a trademark of the Halifax Privateers, and at the same time registered for the Boston Shamrocks. At this time, no progress has been made on the Boston front, but TD Garden had expressed interest in bringing an NLL franchise to Beantown for the third time.
Sakiewicz has also been vocal about adding teams in Canada.
“It’s the first year of a five-year plan,” Sakiewicz said to Lacrosse Magazine in September. “After 12 months in, we are on schedule. There’s a lot more to do. We view it as two five-year strategic plans. We want 18-20 teams quickly. Ultimately, over the next decade, I believe 30 teams or maybe more. I see us being the biggest Canadian top-tier league. We’re the best lacrosse league in the world. I can see us adding 7-8 teams in Canada.”
Like last season’s expansion report that came in July, official announcements may not come for some months. But, the long-speculated addition of the NLL to Canada’s Atlantic coast could finally be on its way.