Report: NHL exploring expansion into Austin and Houston

The sun beats down on Austin’s skyline. Credit: Wikimedia Commons / Quintin Soloviev

San Antonio hockey fans soon may have a local-ish team to root for.

The National Hockey League (NHL) is considering whether to add teams in Austin and Houston, ESPN reported Tuesday.

Citing unnamed sources, ESPN said the league’s board of governors discussed the expansion possibility during its annual meeting Tuesday in New York.

Although the NHL is interested in expanding into the booming Texas market, it will come at a hefty cost to the new ownership groups. League commissioner Gary Bettman previously told the board that any potential expansion team would likely require an owner to cough up at least $2 billion to make the math work.

“The owner of the Houston Rockets has wanted to have a hockey team for quite some time,” University of Texas at San Antonio sports marketing professor Ricard Jensen told the Current in an earlier interview. “The only thing that’s been stopping him is the NHL board of governors, who know Houston wants hockey. So, they’ve put a premium price tag on whatever it costs to go ahead and bring it there.”

Meanwhile, an Austin expansion team would have to compete against both the University of Texas at Austin’s Longhorn athletics and existing team allegiances of transplants from hockey-obsessed Northern cities.

The last time the NHL expanded was in 2021 when the league added the Seattle Kraken.

Tags: