Long time, no type

Don't worry kids, I'm still here. Just been recovering from the end of formal schooling, and trying to recombobulate myself in the process. This, of course, includes this project.

WHERE I AM THUS FAR:

My focus, as I mentioned earlier, is going to be on the pitfalls of putting hockey (back) in Huntington. I realized that as many failed minor league franchises in various sports we have here, a better comparison might be made to similarly-sized markets that have (had) hockey. Thusly...

MY CRITERIA:

Simple really. Comparing to markets that are:
--south of the Mason-Dixon line,
--between 200k-200k in metro population, and
--have (had) a hockey team.

Which gives us several options of varying levels of success. The ones I've become most interested in:

--Asheville (UHL's Smoke 1998-2002, SPHL's Aces 2004-05; mentions of the Smoke on teh intarwebs have the team vanishing in an eponymous puff)
--Shreveport-Bossier City (CHL's Mudbugs, just celebrated 10 years on the ice)
--Beaumont, TX (ECHL's Texas Wildcatters 2003-present; also VERY notable because this franchise WAS the Huntington Blizzard!)
--Huntsville, AL (currently the SPHL's Havoc, most notably the Channel Cats in the CHL and SEHL. Huntsville might very well be Hockeytown South--in addition to the professional history, U-Alabama-Huntsville has a three-decade-plus old hockey program that is now at NCAA D-1 level!)
--Tallahassee (ECHL's Tiger Sharks 1994-2001)
--Roanoke (most notably the ECHL's Express 1993-2004, but has had hockey as far back as the late 1960s in the old EHL)
--Lafayette, LA (ECHL's Louisiana IceGators, one of great rise-and-fall stories in the annals of sports. Ice hockey thrived in the middle of the Bayou for the better part of a decade, but completely fell apart within a couple years. Hell, this might become a sideproject unto itself...)
--Waco, TX (yes, Waco, the Wizards in the old WPHL--another one that seems to have just vanished from the face of the earth)
--Prescott, AZ (CHL's Arizona Sundogs, their newest expansion team)
--Florence, SC (actually technically outside my range--they're UNDER 200,000 metro, had the Pee Dee Pride for several years in the ECHL, and just recently lost the Pee Dee Cyclones in the SPHL)

OTHER CITIES LOOKING AT:
--Winston-Salem: this is where the Cyclones landed. Before them, they had the Polar Twins; before that, the T-Birds; before that, the Parrots, the Icehawks, the Thunderbirds (spelled out), and--again--the Polar Twins. Seven teams in eight leagues in over thirty-five years.
--Pensacola: with the Ice Pilots, a similar situation to the aforementioned IceGators, the difference being that they're staying put for the time being.
--Anchorage: I printed off a good article on the Alaska Aces ownership--being way-the-hell-out there in the opposite direction, I figure this is a decent lead.
--Knoxville: well they're not really doing that badly, but in terms of franchise shifts and general experience they seem to have been in the same boat. That, and I found Jim Bermingham to be very knowledgeable on the subject.

Of course, any feedback on these will be immensely appreciated.

Change in direction

After a consultation with Dr. Bailey and station manager (and narrator!) Alex Reed, I have determined that I have OVERsucceeded. I did in fact cram the history of ice hockey in Huntington into a half-hour, and that half-hour is incredibly cluttered. Somehow, I did not anticipate this, even though this was essentially the desired effect; maybe it's just how my brain works.

Bailey summed it up this way: "You need to tell A story. You're telling twelve on here." In the ensuing brainstorm, Alex tossed up focusing on the pitfalls of getting another hockey team into Huntington, which resulted in a triumphant foot-stomp from me so loud it could be heard at the end of the hallway. I was already thinking in this direction--after my first script, Bailey's primary complaint was that it ended on too much of a downer, and really, the only non-down end I can think of to this tale is another team playing in Huntington.

So for the award effort, the historical element will be limited more to how things did and didn't work with the Hornets and Blizzard, and will also have input from people who were with the previous failed professional teams in football and baseball, as well as the Huntington Heroes (who have not failed as of yet). I'll try and keep speculative parts to a minimum--in 30 minutes, let's say 25 minutes of what is and 5 minutes of what should (never) be. But as far as a historical archive, that corner of the operation will take a rest for the time being.

I'm taking a much more collaborative approach to this, and will be doing much more brainstorming among the people here; in the same vein, I'm inviting you all to give some input as to the direction and shape this should take--who to talk with, angles to come from, things I missed or that didn't come up earlier, etc.