Relocation (and playoff) history will be made in August
By Ryan Pike
3 years agoAs we well know in Calgary, National Hockey League teams can relocate. Since the NHL’s formation in 1917, teams have relocated about a dozen times. While relocated teams have played each other quite often in the Stanley Cup playoffs, the qualifying round series between the Flames and the Winnipeg Jets will be a unicorn of a series: it’s the first time that two teams that relocated from the same city will ever meet in the post-season.
A brief history of relocations
- The Quebec Bulldogs move to Hamilton, become the Tigers (1920)
- The Pittsburgh Pirates move to Philadelphia, become the Quakers (1930)
- The Ottawa Senators move to St. Louis, become the Eagles (1934)
- The California Golden Seals move to Cleveland, become the Barons (1976)
- The Kansas City Scouts move to Denver, become the Colorado Rockies (1976)
- The Atlanta Flames move to Calgary, remain the Flames (1980)
- The Rockies move to East Rutherford, become the New Jersey Devils (1982)
- The Minnesota North Stars move to Dallas, become the Stars (1993)
- The Quebec Nordiques move to Denver, become the Colorado Avalanche (1995)
- The Winnipeg Jets move to Phoenix, become the Coyotes (1996)
- The Hartford Whalers move to Raleigh, become the Carolina Hurricanes (1997)
- The Atlanta Thrashers move to Winnipeg, become the Jets (2011)
(We’re not counting the Barons folding the merging with the North Stars in 1978 because it was too weird to be a straightforward relocation.)
A brief history of playoff series between relocated teams
There weren’t multiple teams that had relocated in the NHL until the late 1970s, so series between relocated teams were fairly rare. And relocated teams tended to be bad, as the Barons never made the playoffs and the Rockies only made them once. The Flames and Devils became respectable post-relocation, but were in opposite conferences.
- Dallas vs. Colorado (1999 Western Conference Final)
- Phoenix vs. Colorado (2000 Western Conference Quarterfinal)
- Dallas vs. Colorado (2000 Western Conference Final)
- Dallas vs. New Jersey (2000 Stanley Cup Final)
- New Jersey vs. Carolina (2001 Eastern Conference Quarterfinal)
- Colorado vs. New Jersey (2001 Stanley Cup Final)
- New Jersey vs. Carolina (2002 Eastern Conference Quarterfinal)
- Dallas vs. Colorado (2004 Western Conference Quarterfinal)
- Dallas vs. Colorado (2006 Western Conference Quarterfinal)
- New Jersey vs. Carolina (2006 Eastern Conference Semi-Final)
- New Jersey vs. Carolina (2009 Eastern Conference Quarterfinal)
- Calgary vs. Colorado (2019 Western Conference Quarterfinal)
The Flames have made the playoffs a lot – not recently, but relative to their time since moving to Calgary – but until 1993 they were the only relocated team in their conference. Now that there are four relocated clubs in the West you’d expect a lot of meetings in the playoffs, but it’s been rare for more than one of them to make the playoffs at a time.
But now, finally, the Flames are meeting the Jets (2.0) in the playoffs in the first post-season Battle of Atlanta in NHL history.
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