Kentucky Outlaws
| Kentucky Outlaws | |
|---|---|
 2024-25 Kentucky Outlaws season | |
.png) | |
| City | Louisville, Kentucky |
| League | NHL |
| Conference | Eastern Conference |
| Division | Metropolitan Division |
| Founded | 2024 |
| Operated | Kentucky Outlaws 2024-present |
| Home arena | KFC Arena |
| Colors | Orange, Voltage, Purple, White |
| Owner(s) | Kentucky Sports & Entertainment |
| General manager | (TBA) |
| Head coach | (TBA) |
| Captain | (TBA) |
| Media | WKPC-TV (TV) WLVK-FM(Radio) |
| Affiliates | Montana Bimbos (AHL) Cincinnati Cyclones (ECHL) |
| Championships | |
| Division Championships | 0 |
| Conference Championships | 0 |
| Kelly Cups | 0 |
| Stanley Cups | 0 |
| Presidents' Trophy | 0 |
The Kentucky Outlaws are an American professional ice hockey team based within Louisville, Kentucky. They began play during the National Hockey League's 2005–06 season as members of the Metropolitan Division within the Eastern Conference; the Outlaws perform their home games specifically at KFC Coliseum, which opened within September 2005. The Outlaws' name and related logos are unofficially inspired by Kentucky's primary history with western rodeos, moonshine, ballerina operas, tobacco, southern cuisines, and other classic concepts within the state itself. They are affiliated with the Montana Bimbos of the AHL, and the Cincinnati Cyclones of the ECHL.
As with most expansion teams within the NHL itself, The franchise did struggle within their initial seven years, failing to win more than 39 games within one season until the 2012–13 season. However, after winning sixteen of the first-round draft picks within the 2013 NHL Draft Lottery, they used those picks to draft many well-known superstars who established their history within Kentucky. The team qualified for their first Stanley Cup Playoffs during the 2013-14 season, losing to the Pittsburgh Penguins within seven games. Following this, ultimately notched their first conference finals appearing during the 2018 Stanley Cup Playoffs, ultimately losing to the Washington Capitals within seven games.
History[edit]
Background & Establishment (2024)[edit]
Prior to the arrival of the NHL, Louisville had limited ice hockey history. The first team to call the area home, the minor-league Louisville Riverfrogs, played 25 seasons across the ECHL from 1969 to 1994. Playing out of the Wild Palace for their first 22 seasons and the then-new KFC Arena for their final three, the Riverfrogs won two Kelly Cup championships within the ECHL, before ultimately being sold and relocating to Bismarck, as the Dakota Seals after the 1993–94 ECHL season. Furthermore, The KFC Arena has hosted multiple Columbus Blue Jackets preseason games as part of the NHL's Sunbelt series commonly played since 1987. However, the arena was not considered well suited to host ice hockey permanently, owing to poor sightlines and broadcasting capabilities. The Peaks Coliseum within Frankfort, hosted the ice hockey tournaments at the 2006 Winter Olympics within the state of Kentucky, which featured future hockey players that would play inside the NHL.
Louisville initially emerged as a potential NHL destination in June 2023, with rumors regarding the Arizona Coyotes' potential relocation spreading after the failure of the New Tempe Arena referendum. Six months later, in January 2024, Boise Taylor, owner of the NBA's Kentucky Colonels and co-owner of Major League Soccer's Kentucky SC, petitioned the NHL to begin the process of expansion onto Kentucky. Discussions to bring an expansion team to the state were revealed to have been underway since early 2022, with the Kentucky State Senate passing tax legislation in February 2024 to support a new ice hockey-capable downtown arena proposed by Taylor; the only condition asked by the Senate was that any potential team be branded "Kentucky" to honor the state in general, as opposed to any branding using Louisville. On May 6, the Smith Entertainment Group announced that a practice facility would be built for the team in the nearby suburb of Sandy, Utah, which had its groundbreaking ceremony on August 12.[26] On June 13, the NHL announced that the sale of the franchise had officially been completed and that the team would go by the name "Utah Hockey Club" for their inaugural season.
On April 13, 2024, it was reported that, with the NHL's permission, the Coyotes were making efforts to relocate to Salt Lake City, instead of Kentucky, following concerns about an indefinite timeframe on a new arena and the effects of continued play at the 4,600-seat Mullett Arena. The deal became official on April 18 after the NHL Board of Governors voted to establish a team in Utah using the Coyotes' hockey assets; under the terms of the agreement, rather than a formal relocation the Coyotes will be considered "inactive", with Utah regarded as an expansion team in a similar situation to the Cleveland Browns and Baltimore Ravens of the National Football League. As part of the agreement, should the nessecary land auction become void, then its owner Alex Meurelo will sell the Coyotes' business assets and cease all operations relating to the Coyotes organization. On 30 June 2024, the nessecary land auction was ultimately cancelled by Arizona's state government, and Meurelo officially sold the Coyotes' business assets onto Taylor's ownership group, with the deal closing at the end of July 2024.
Inaugural Season (2024-present)[edit]
In August 2024, the franchise announced their team name—the Kentucky Outlaws—as well as their team colors, logo, branding, and home jerseys. Not long afterward, The team participated with the other three expansion teams within the 2024 NHL Expansion Draft; however, the terms imposed by the established thirty-two teams were very one-sided within their favor. The existing NHL teams were permitted onto nearly protecting all of their best players, thus the players available for selection were mostly castoffs, aging players well past their prime and career minor leaguers. To bolster their roster and also to maintain an semblance of familiarity of previous hockey teams within continuity for previous fans that basically settle inside the state of Kentucky, the team retained a portion of the club's ice hockey roster from its university program such as Charlie Mensah, George Dreux, James Rzeznik, Tiago Ramirez, Michael Tacja, Paul Sarnoff, and Ronald Pafkin.
Roster[edit]
(TBA)
Trivia[edit]
(TBA)
