Wenatchee Gets The Yeti

As was reported here on HBIC on June 6, it seemed the wheels were turning on a potential relocation for the Winnipeg Ice. While the article that day had ChekTV's Rick Dhaliwal speculating that Chilliwack may be the Ice's new home, it seems he was about 142 miles away from the actual landing spot with the announcment today that the Ice had been sold to David White of the California-based Shoot the Puck Foundation who owns the BCHL's Wenatchee Wild in Wenatchee, Washington. With the book officially closed on another failed attempt to have the WHL set up shop in Winnipeg, the league will look for its newly-relocated franchise to make waves in the US Division as the Wenatchee Wild when they begin play for the 2023-24. As for the former owners of the Ice, I doubt 50 Below Sports and Entertainment will be receiving a Christmas card from the WHL this year.

As per the WHL's statement today,

"The sale and relocation of the Winnipeg franchise has received the approval of the WHL Board of Governors and is effective immediately. Wenatchee becomes the sixth U.S.-based WHL team and will join the WHL's U.S. Division and Western Conference for the 2023-24 season. The relocation to Wenatchee will allow the WHL to balance its Western and Eastern Conferences with 11 member Clubs in each Conference starting next season.

"Unfortunately, multiple attempts by the ICE ownership to construct an arena facility of acceptable WHL standards in Winnipeg, based on the agreed upon timeframes, were unsuccessful, leading to the relocation to Wenatchee."

That last paragraph is loaded with all sorts of innuendo as everyone in Winnipeg is likely aware that the Ice seemingly never put one shovel into the ground in or near the Manitoba capital when it came to constructing an arena, so I'm not sure from where the "multiple attempts" line came.

The "agreed upon timeframes" was the WHL exercising its powers of persuasion when the Ice failed to meet deadlines they had set as conditions on the relocation of the Kootenay Ice to Winnipeg, and this relocation conclusion seemed to be inevitable as the days, weeks, and months were crossed off on the calendar.

In short, the Ice were doomed the moment that 50 Below couldn't secure a site to build a WHL-suitable arena in or near Winnipeg, and both owner Greg Fettes and general manager Matt Cockell had to know the writing was on the wall. When Cockell was dealing away all his future picks for talent in the hopes of winning the Memorial Cup, how close was the end from his perspective, knowing that he mortgaged any future of this club for one last hurrah this past season?

I doubt that's a question that will ever be answered, but the Wild now start their WHL era with just one selection in the top six rounds in the next three bantam drafts, and that selection is a fifth-round pick in case you were wondering. If you were excited to see the Wild come in and possibly upset a few teams, I wouldn't get my hopes up until at least 2028 for that to happen. With not being able to draft blue-chip players, they have very little hope of that happening, and they'll need to deal away any talent left to recoup those picks and restock the cupboards. It's going to be a rough few years in Wenatchee thanks to the Ice's management team.

In speaking with a few people, some of the Winnipeg Ice staff found out via Twitter that the franchise had been sold. There was no meeting with Greg Fettes or Matt Cockell for any of the staff letting them know that their hockey futures were about to change, and by mid-afternoon all of the staff had been fired from their respective positions with the organization. As much as you may be shaking your head in disbelief at how the staff were treated, one shouldn't surprised that the people who made the Ice games fun and entertaining were the people who got zero respect in this process.

On top of that, Greg Fettes published a long-winded piece on Twitter that contained the lines, "I'm sorry we let you down. Please know that we did our absolute best until the very end."

Did you do your best, though? You, Greg, made the WHL promises you either didn't or couldn't keep, and now the Winnipeg Ice are playing in Wenatchee, Washington. If that's your "absolute best", we have a lot to talk about when it comes to standards because you failed miserably on fulfilling the very promises that allowed you to move the franchise from Cranbrook, BC to Winnipeg, Manitoba. While the apology for letting Winnipeg Ice fans, staff, billets, and players down should be issued sincerely, saying that you did your "absolute best" seems like a desperate attempt to save face when it was mostly your own doing that caused the franchise to leave Winnipeg. Maybe I'm wrong and don't know everything that went on behind the scenes, but that's how it looks on the surface.

At the end of the day, the Ice left Winnipeg almost as quickly as they left Cranbrook which, if you want to be vindictive, feels kind of karmic considering everything Cranbrook tried to do to save the team. I'm not here to claim some sort of vengeance, though, because it was hard to understand how and why the Ice were allowed to move here without a suitable arena in the city, and it seems that the promises made to secure that relocation melted away like ice under the hot sun.

Best of luck to the Wenatchee Wild next season. I have a feeling that David White will ensure that the Wild remain on the Washington landscape for longer than four years, and that his "absolute best" will be a much different and much higher standard than what the Winnipeg Ice set in their four short years in the Manitoba capital.

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!