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Arizona Coyotes

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Phoenix Coyotes
File:PhoenixCoyotes.png
ConferenceWestern
DivisionPacific
Founded1972
HistoryWinnipeg Jets
1972-1996
Phoenix Coyotes
1996-present
Home arenaJobing.com Arena
CityGlendale, Arizona
Team colorsBrick Red, Sand, Black, and White
MediaFSN Arizona
KAZT (Channel 27) KDUS (1060 AM)
Owner(s)Canada Wayne Gretzky
Jerry Moyes
General managerCanada Don Maloney
Head coachCanada Wayne Gretzky
CaptainCanada Shane Doan
Minor league affiliatesSan Antonio Rampage (AHL)
Phoenix RoadRunners (ECHL)
Laredo Bucks (CHL)
Stanley CupsNone
Conference championshipsNone
Division championshipsNone

The Phoenix Coyotes are a professional ice hockey team based in the Phoenix suburb of Glendale. They are members of the Pacific Division of the Western Conference of the National Hockey League (NHL).

Franchise history

Phoenix's first logo (1996-2003).

Winnipeg Years — WHA and NHL

The team began play as the Winnipeg Jets, one of the founding franchises in the World Hockey Association (WHA). The Jets were the most successful team in the short-lived WHA, winning three Avco World Trophies, the league's championship trophy, and making the finals five out of the WHA's seven seasons. It then became one of the four teams admitted to the NHL when the rival leagues merged in 1979.

However, the club was never able to translate that success into the NHL after the merger, in part because they played in the same division as the powerful Edmonton Oilers and Calgary Flames. While they made the playoffs 11 times in 16 seasons, they only won two playoff series. Due to the way the playoffs were structured for much of their Winnipeg run, the Jets were all but assured of having to defeat either the Oilers or the Flames to make it to the conference finals.

Despite strong fan support, the money simply was not around for the team, especially after player salaries began spiraling up in the early 1990s. The team was sold to Phoenix businessmen Steven Gluckstern and Richard Burke, and in 1996, the club moved to Arizona and became the Phoenix Coyotes.

The early Phoenix years (1996-2005)

In the summer that the move took place, the franchise saw the exit of Jets stars like Teemu Selanne and Alexei Zhamnov, while the team added established superstar Jeremy Roenick who teamed up with power wings Keith Tkachuk and Rick Tocchet to form a dynamic 1-2-3 offensive punch that led the Coyotes through their first years in Arizona. Also impressive were young players like Shane Doan (the last remaining original Jet), Oleg Tverdovsky and goaltender Nikolai Khabibulin, arguably the most popular player in Coyotes history, whom the fans nicknamed the "Bulin Wall".

Another key addition to the squad was fleet sniper Mike Gartner, who had come over from the Toronto Maple Leafs. Despite his speed, and scoring his 700th career goal on December 15, 1997, Gartner battled injuries as 1997 became 1998, and the Coyotes did not renew his contract. He retired at the end of the season.

After arriving in Phoenix, the team posted six consecutive .500 or better seasons, making the playoffs in every year but one. They were tremendously popular, in part due to the large number of Northern expatriates in the Phoenix area. The one year they missed the playoffs, the Coyotes became the first team in NHL history to post 90 points — long the standard of excellence in the NHL — and yet still miss the playoffs.

Phoenix-area developer Steve Ellman bought the team from Burke (who had bought out Gluckstern in 1998) in 2001, with Wayne Gretzky as a part-owner and head of hockey operations.

To this day, the Coyotes have never made it out of the first round of the playoffs. The franchise has not won a playoff series since 1987, when it was still in Winnipeg. The closest that they came to advancing past the first round was during the 1999 playoffs, when they lost a heartbreaking Game 7 to the St. Louis Blues. In 2002, the Coyotes posted 95 points, one point behind their best total as an NHL team, but made a rather meek first-round exit from the playoffs, being eliminated in five games by the San Jose Sharks.

However, several poor personnel decisions sent the Coyotes to the lower echelon of the NHL for two years. Attendance levels dropped considerably, worrying many league executives. In addition, an unfavorable lease with America West Arena, where the team played for its first eight years in Phoenix, had the team bleeding red ink.

In addition to the Coyotes' unfavorable lease with America West Arena, the building itself was inadequate as a venue for hockey. Several seats were obstructed because the arena's floor was not designed with a hockey rink in mind, unlike most modern arenas. Seating capacity had to be cut down to 16,000 — the second-smallest in the league at the time — after the first season. Even then, a stretch of the upper deck actually hung over the boards, obstructing the views of around 3,000 spectators. Some fans even claimed that they saw places where the original concrete had been sheared off to create retractable seats for hockey. After attempts failed either to renovate America West or build an arena in Scottsdale, the Coyotes built Glendale Arena (now known as Jobing.com Arena), and moved there in 2003. Simultaneously, the team changed its logo and uniforms; it was a departure from the previous multi-colored kit and was an apparent nod to hockey purists.

The Gretzky Era (2005 - present)

The Coyotes' alternate logo
File:2006NHLAllStarGame.png
Coyotes Canceled All-Star Logo

On 6 August 2005, Brett Hull, son of former Jet Bobby Hull, was signed and assigned the elder Hull's retired # 9. Two days later, the Coyotes introduced Gretzky as its new head coach, replacing Rick Bowness, despite the fact that he had never coached at any level of hockey. The Coyotes Ring of Honor was unveiled on 8 October, inducting Gretzky and Bobby Hull. One week later, Brett Hull announced his retirement. On 21 January 2006, Jets great Thomas Steen was the third inductee to the Ring of Honor. On 13 April, Steve Ellman announced an agreement for Jerry Moyes to assume majority ownership control of the Coyotes, Glendale Arena and the National Lacrosse League's Arizona Sting. Also in the 2005-06 season, the Coyotes were planning to host the NHL all-star game. Due to the Olympics, that was canceled.

The team returned to Winnipeg on 17 September, 2006 to play a pre-season game against the Edmonton Oilers, but were shut-out 5-0 before a sellout crowd of 15,015.

On 11 April 2007, CEO Jeff Shumway announced that general manager Michael Barnett (Gretzky's agent for over 20 years), senior executive vice president of hockey operations Cliff Fletcher, and San Antonio Rampage's general manager and Coyotes' assistant general manager Laurence Gilman "have been relieved of their duties." The Coyotes finished the 2006-2007 season 31-46-5, its worst record since relocating to Phoenix. The Jets/Coyotes are the only former WHA team to have not appeared in the Stanley Cup Finals, and the oldest NHL franchise to not do so.[1]

On May 29 2007, Jeff Shumway announced that Don Maloney had agreed to a multi-year contract to become General Manager of the Coyotes. As per club policy, terms of the contract were not disclosed. [2]

Season-by-season record

This is a partial list of the last five seasons completed by the Coyotes. For the full season-by-season history, see Phoenix Coyotes seasons

Note: GP = Games played, W = Wins, L = Losses, T = Ties, OTL = Overtime Losses, Pts = Points, GF = Goals for, GA = Goals against, PIM = Penalties in minutes

Records as of April 8, 2007. [3]

Season GP W L T OTL Pts GF GA PIM Finish Playoffs
2001-02 82 40 27 9 6 95 228 210 1154 2nd, Pacific Lost in Conference Quarterfinals, 1-4 (Sharks)
2002-03 82 31 35 11 5 78 204 230 1433 4th, Pacific Did not qualify
2003-04 82 22 36 18 6 68 188 245 1300 5th, Pacific Did not qualify
2004-05 Season cancelled due to 2004-05 NHL Lockout
2005-061 82 38 39 — 5 81 246 271 1493 5th, Pacific Did not qualify
2006-07 82 31 46 — 5 67 216 284 1038 5th, Pacific Did not qualify
1 As of the 2005-06 NHL season, all games will have a winner; the OTL column includes SOL (Shootout losses).

Notable players

Current roster

As of July 12, 2007. [1]

Goaltenders
# Player Catches Acquired Place of Birth
31 Canada Curtis Joseph L 2005 Keswick, Ontario
32 Sweden Mikael Tellqvist L 2006 Sundbyberg, Sweden
Defensemen
# Player Shoots Acquired Place of Birth
2 United States Keith Ballard L 2004 Baudette, Minnesota
4 Czech Republic Zbynek Michalek R 2005 Jindrichuv Hradec, Czechoslovakia
5 United States Matt Jones L 2002 Downers Grove, Illinois
36 Canada Brendan Bell L 2007 Ottawa, Ontario
44 Canada Nick Boynton R 2006 Nobleton, Ontario
53 Canada Derek Morris – A R 2004 Edmonton, Alberta
55 Canada Ed Jovanovski – A (IR) L 2006 Windsor, Ontario
77 Canada Travis Roche R 2006 Grande Cache, Alberta
Forwards
# Player Position Shoots Acquired Place of Birth
8 Finland Niko Kapanen C L 2007 Hameenlinna, Finland
12 Switzerland Patrick Fischer (IR) C L 2006 Zug, Switzerland
13 Canada Daniel Carcillo LW L 2007 King City, Ontario
14 United States Kevyn Adams C R 2007 Washington, District of Columbia
15 Canada Mike Zigomanis C R 2006 North York, Ontario
19 Canada Shane Doan – C RW R 1995 Halkirk, Alberta
20 Sweden Fredrik Sjostrom RW L 2001 Fargelanda, Sweden
21 United States Bill Thomas RW R 2006 Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
22 Sweden Mathias Tjarnqvist LW L 2007 Umea, Sweden
23 United States Jeff Taffe C L 2006 Hastings, Minnesota
24 Canada Josh Gratton LW L 2006 Scarborough, Ontario
28 Canada Steven Reinprecht – A C L 2006 Edmonton, Alberta
29 Canada Yanick Lehoux RW R 2006 Montreal, Quebec
40 Canada Mike Ricci (IR) C L 2004 Scarborough, Ontario
43 Slovakia Tomáš Surový LW L 2007 Banská Bystrica, Slovakia

Team captains

Note: This list does not include captains from the Winnipeg Jets (NHL & WHA).

Hall of Famers

Note: Hawerchuk and Hull played for Winnipeg.

Retired numbers

The Coyotes continue to honor the retired numbers of the Winnipeg Jets franchise; the banners for Hull and Steen at Jobing.com Arena are in the Jets' blue, white and red.

First-round draft picks

Note: This list does not include selections of the Winnipeg Jets.

Franchise scoring leaders

These are the top-ten point-scorers in franchise (Winnipeg & Phoenix) history. Figures are updated after each completed NHL regular season.

Note: Pos = Position; GP = Games Played; G = Goals; A = Assists; Pts = Points; P/G = Points per game; * = current Coyotes player

Player Pos GP G A Pts P/G
Dale Hawerchuk C 713 379 550 929 1.30
Thomas Steen RW 950 264 553 817 .86
Keith Tkachuk LW 640 323 300 623 .97
Teppo Numminen D 1098 108 426 534 .49
Paul MacLean RW 527 248 270 518 .98
Shane Doan* RW 730 172 245 417 .57
Doug Smail LW 691 189 208 397 .58
Laurie Boschman LW 526 152 227 379 .72
Jeremy Roenick C 384 141 210 351 .91
Morris Lukowich LW 431 168 177 345 .80

NHL awards and trophies

Jack Adams Award

Franchise records

Template:H4

Template:H4

References

  1. ^ GENERAL MANAGER MICHAEL BARNETT & STAFF RELIEVED OF DUTIES
  2. ^ Former Rangers’ Assistant GM Agrees To Multi-Year Contract
  3. ^ Hockeydb.com, Phoenix Coyotes season statistics and records.

See also

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