It was shortly rumored, but Palm Springs, California will be the 32nd franchise in the AHL starting in 2021-22. They will be the affiliate of the Seattle Your-Name-Heres and will play in a brand new arena.

The biggest question I have is not if the Palm Springs area can support a team, it’s more a matter of if the AHL will actually make the Pacific Division play a full 76-game schedule rather than the 68-gamer they play now. It makes sense when you have eight teams in your division now, you should be like the rest of the league and not try to hold said league hostage to get what you want like a petulant child. I mean, the Texas Stars and San Antonio Rampage still have to play a full 76-game slate despite their division counterparts having eight games less.

When they news came out that the AHL was basically bullied by those Western teams to have a 68-game season or they’ll start their own league— the smart play would have been to let them go with their own league and let them flounder a bit before absorbing them. But I guess you gotta play nicey-nice when it comes to those teams because they have some money and some influence. At the same time, you really could’ve been an ass to them and actually forced them to play by your rules and not their own.

Though it’s not all great when it comes to the smaller schedule. Since they’ve come into the league in 2015, none of the Pacific teams playing a smaller schedule have made it to the Calder Cup Final. The rest doesn’t help for the conditioning, I suppose.

We’ll have to see what becomes of the Palm Spring team, it’s a good add to a California market that desperately wants hockey…though Palm Springs isn’t the bustling metropolis I would think for a hockey team. They haven’t had one in the history of hockey that’s been recorded– but I guess it’s a market ripe for the picking.