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WHL Western Hockey League

Weekly Sports League and Franchise Report

by Dan Krieger
June 19, 2023 - Western Hockey League (WHL)


BASEBALL

Southern League: A groundbreaking ceremony was held this week for the start of construction on a new downtown stadium in Knoxville for the Tennessee Smokies of the Double-A Southern League. The stadium is expected to be ready for the 2025 season, at which time the team will be renamed the Knoxville Smokies. The Smokies started in Knoxville in 1972 and were known as the Knoxville Smokies from 1993 to 1999 until moving to the Kodak/Sevierville area as the Tennessee Smokies for the 2000 season.

International League: The Syracuse Mets of the Triple-A International League will play a game in August as the Syracuse Shot Clocks as part of an alternate theme night to honor the 24-second shot clock introduced to professional basketball in 1954 by the owner of the National Basketball Association's Syracuse Nationals (now the Philadelphia 76ers).

Northwoods League: The Bismarck (ND) Larks of the summer-collegiate Northwoods League will play a game next month as the Missouri River Motorboaters as a tribute to the city's location on the Missouri River and to the team's boat loving fans.

Major League Baseball: The Nevada Senate and Nevada Assembly approved $180 million in tax credits toward a new MLB ballpark to be built in Las Vegas for the relocated Oakland A's, but the governor's signature is still needed. This amount is only a small portion of the total ballpark cost that the A's will still need to finance. If the ballpark moves forward, it would not be ready until 2028.

Alaska Baseball League: The summer-collegiate ABL recently started its 2023 season with the same five teams as last season. Two teams are based in Anchorage and the others in Palmer, Kenai and Chugiak. The ABL has been around since 1974.

Texas Collegiate League: The summer-collegiate TCL recently started its 2023 season late last month with the same five teams as last season-two based in Louisiana and three based in Texas.

BASKETBALL

The Basketball League: The Pontiac (MI) Pharaohs of the semi-pro TBL confirmed the team will be part of the league's 2024 season. The team started out in the TBL's 2022 season as the Lansing (MI) Pharaohs and sat out the 2023 season after announcing a planned move to Pontiac, where the team was originally going to be called the Oakland County Pharaohs.

American Basketball Association: The semi-pro ABA announced teams called the Stone Mountain (GA) Strong Steppers and Carolina Kings (Greensboro, NC) have been added for the 2023-24 season. The ABA also announced a team called the Charlotte Flight will start play in 2024.

FOOTBALL

United Football League: The proposed 14-team eight-man outdoor UFL, which has pushed by the start of its inaugural 2023 season from April 1, to May 13 and then to June 24, announced teams will not be playing a regular-season schedule this year as the league works to promote team brands and develop sponsorships in each market for a start in 2024. The UFL plans to hold team scrimmages in each market from July to November instead of regular-season games. The UFL was organized in 2021 from the failed National Gridiron League and previously cancelled plans to start play in 2022.

National Arena League: The NAL has terminated the membership of the Albany (NY) Empire franchise for failing to pay current and overdue league assessments. The league will revise the remaining 2023 season schedule for the remaining six teams. The Albany Empire had a 1-6 record and had seven games left on its 14-game schedule.

The Arena League: The proposed new six-on-six indoor TAL announced its fourth team will be located in Kansas City (MO) when the league starts play with four teams in June 2024. Springfield (MO), Duluth (MN) and Waterloo (IA) were previously announced as the other locations for TAL teams. Also, the new Springfield team announced it will be called the Ozarks Lunkers when the league starts play next year. A lunker refers to an exceptionally large fish for its type.

HOCKEY

Can-Am Junior Hockey League: As of now, the independent CAJHL, which started play in January 2022 when six teams left the former junior-level Western States Hockey League midway through its 2021-22 season to form the league, states it has seven teams set to play in the 2023-24 season. The league operated with five Alberta-based teams last season, but the Calgary Warriors will not return and the league added three other Alberta-based teams called the Vulcan Rampage, Northern Alberta Lightning (Viking) and Southern Alberta Mustangs (Stavely).

Western Hockey League: The Wenatchee (WA) Wild of the Junior-A British Columbia Hockey League (BCHL), which ended its association with the Canadian Junior Hockey League after the 2020-21 season and recently broke away from the governance of Hockey Canada to become an independent league, is now joining the major-junior WHL starting with the 2023-24 season. The Wild has purchased the WHL's Winnipeg ICE franchise and is relocating the team to Wenatchee. The Winnipeg ICE was unsuccessful in building a new arena in Winnipeg as promised when the WHL's former Kootenay ICE left Cranbrook (British Columbia) and moved to Winnipeg for the 2019-20 season. The Wenatchee Wild was the BCHL's only U.S.-based team, while the Wild will become the 22-team WHL's sixth U.S.-based team and part of the U.S. Division, which has four other teams based in Washington (Seattle, Everett, Spokane and Tri-City) and one team in Oregon (Portland). The BCHL is reduced from 18 to 17 teams with the loss of Wenatchee.

SOCCER

Liga Expansión MX: Mexico's second division men's pro league known as the Liga Expansión MX will start the first part (Apertura) of its two-part 2023-24 Apertura/Clausura season on July 21, 2023, but the league will undergo some changes prior to the start of the second part (Clausura) of the season in January 2024. To further develop young talent in Mexico, the Liga MX Under-20 league affiliated with Mexico's top Liga MX will be merged with the 18 teams of Liga Expansión MX to create a new Liga Expansión Sub-23 (Under-23) league. This new league is expected to have 24 teams with 18 of those teams being affiliates of Liga MX teams. Relegation and promotion between the two leagues will return.

Major Arena Soccer League 2: The MASL2 (M2), which is the second-division league to the Major Arena Soccer League, announced a team called the Wisconsin Conquerors will start play in the 2024-25 season after completion of work on an indoor facility in Weston (WI), about 85 miles west of Green Bay. The MASL2 recently announced the MASL's St. Louis Ambush will add an MASL2 team for 2023-24, and a new team called Atletico Orlando will play as a travel-only MASL2 team in the 2023-24 season.

National Independent Soccer Association: An official with the Cal United Strikers FC, which last played in the 2022 season of the Division-III professional NISA, is organizing a new club called Strikers FC (Orange County, CA) that hopes to start play in the NISA for the 2024 season. The NISA has also received an application from the Phoenix-based Arizona Monsoon FC for the 2024 season.

OTHER

Athletes Unlimited - Softball: The Athletes Unlimited is holding its second year of the women's Athletes Unlimited Softball AUX series this month in Rosemont (IL). Three teams called Team Orange, Team Blue and Team Gold are competing in three events (June 12-15, June 18-21 and June 24-27) ahead of the five-week 2023 Athletes Unlimited women's professional softball league that will start on July 28 in Rosemont.

Premier Rugby Sevens: North America's top-tier men's and women's rugby sevens competition known as the PR7s held its first event this weekend in Austin with all four Eastern Conference clubs (Pittsburgh Steeltoes, New York Locals, Southern Headliners and Texas Team) in action. Both men's and women's teams from each club participated. The rest of the PR7s season includes a Western Conference event next weekend in Minneapolis, the Western Conference finals in San Jose next month, the Eastern Conference finals in Pittsburgh next month, and the 2023 PR7s Championship in Washington (DC) in August.

Dan Krieger is the creator of the Weekly Sports League & Franchise Report, which has been tracking changes in the sports world's leagues, teams and nicknames since April 2007.

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Western Hockey League Stories from June 19, 2023


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