One day before the International Hockey League begins its 55th consecutive playoff season, its oldest franchise went out of business.
After missing out on the playoffs for only the third time in 26 years, Ted Parfet, owner of the Michigan K-Wings, said he will ask the league to put the K-Wings on inactive status.
"We won't be a member of any league," said Stephen Doherty, director of marketing and public relations for the K-Wings. "It's strictly an economic issue." He denied that the decision by the NHL's Dallas Stars to end its affiliation with Michigan was the cause. That was announced at the same press conference Monday morning in Kalamazoo. He said the cost of doing business in the IHL has just gotten to be too much for the small, home-grown outfit, and the Parfets didn't want to deal with the stress and work associated with assimilating into another league.
Ted Parfet and his wife, Martha, bought into the IHL in 1974 as a way to fill their 5,113 seat arena when they weren't holding other shows there. The K-Wings were the last IHL franchise to receive subsidies from the league, something that was given to the original IHL organizations when faraway places like Salt Lake City wanted to buy into the league.
Utah has had discusions with the Dallas Stars, but nothing has been decided yet because of the playoffs, according to Tim Mouser, Grizzlies president and chief operating officer.
"We've had discusions," he said. "They're focused on the Stanely Cup, and we're getting ready for the Turner Cup, but sometime after that, then we'll have serious discusions."
The Grizzlies would like to affiliate with an NHL franchise and Mouser said they're very impressed with Dallas' organization.
"We think affiliation is the way of the future in the IHL," he said.
"We've sent a number of proposals out to a number of teams . . . We have two turner cups when we were an affiliated team."
The IHL began half a century ago as a way for athletes returning from World War II to play professional hockey in the Detroit-Windsor area. Four teams made up that first league and allowed those war vets the chance to realize childhood dreams postponed by war.
This June, 55 years after that first 15-game season, the IHL will anoint another champion. None of the original franchises still exist and the cost of buying into the league has gone from $1,000 to $5 million.
What was once a league centered in the midwest and southern Canada now spans the entire continent from Florida to California. Bus travel has been replaced by airline tickets.
But that original idea — to offer talented athletes the chance to realize their dreams of playing professional hockey — remains the same. The IHL has undergone innumerable changes in the last 55 years, and even the last decade.
But the current league president said the league's future is sure and promising.
"We're making adjustments all the time," said Doug Moss, president of the IHL since July 1998. "It's a fluid situation, but we have something good going here . . . Professional sports is not an easy business. We're now in great markets and great buildings. The last couple of years we've changed our philosophy somewhat. I don't think our product has ever been better."
Moss said the league has gone from trying to compete with the National Hockey League to trying to compliment it. A record seven teams have affiliations with NHL teams, which means the NHL teams pay players to skate for the IHL team until they're needed by the "parent" team.
It's a concept that's worked well for baseball, but has only recently been adopted by hockey. None of the Western Conference teams have true affiliations, although Utah has had affiliations with New York and Los Angeles in the past. Currently Long Beach has a less formal relationship with the Los Angeles Kings.
The league has fluctuated from around seven or eight teams to as many as 19, and undergone as many changes as the teams that play in the IHL. The 90s began with 11 teams, and there are now 12 clubs, after Monday's announcement.
Moss said all the current teams are stable and have good community support with solid ownership.
"We're talking to some communities about expansion possibilities, but we've got to have the right combination of factors to go into a place," Moss said. "It's got to make sense economically before we'll expand."
Gone are the days when teams were allowed to join the league only to fold a year and in one case, a few months later (Albany in 1990). Moss is concerned that he has a team in California, a team in Houston and a team in Orlando with nothing in between making travel expenses enormous.
"We'd like to develop some more regional rivalries," he said. "We're going to do what we as a league can to reduce travel costs and help reduce operating expenses." Regardless, Moss said owning an IHL team isn't a big money-making proposition.
"I don't think (the owners) do it for the money," he said. "They do it because they love it. Most of our owners are very involved in their communities. (A sports franchise) is a way to link a community together. They're trying to give back."
Moss said he doesn't expect any other teams to leave before next fall, and in fact, the league has been discussing expansion with several cities, including Toronto and Montreal.
"We're determined not to repeat the mistakes of the past," Moss said, pointing out that moves to Quebec and San Francisco were made because they were big cities and were both disastrous.
"We're going after a market that's been disenfranchised by major league sports," he added. "People who can't afford NBA tickets, young people, families, and we're offering them the chance to see tremendous professional hockey . . . Success doesn't mean you have to be in the biggest markets in the country."
You can reach Amy Donaldson by e-mail at ADonald512@aol.com.