The biggest gamble the NHL ever made in Las Vegas was not when it put a team there in 2017 — the league knew that would work. It was putting an outdoor game there in 1991.
Aside from a couple of meaningless games in the 1950s, it was the NHL’s first venture outdoors.
At the time, it seemed nothing more than another Las Vegas gimmick. As one might expect, the ice crew had a tough time maintaining a cool enough playing surface — it was 85 degrees at puck drop. What nobody predicted, though, was the swarm of grasshoppers that ended up on the ice.
Being a preseason game, the final score didn’t matter, but the sold-out stadium that evening gave the NHL a taste of the possibilities. Now, outdoor games are a more-than-yearly occurrence.
The Utah Mammoth are the lone team that has yet to participate in one, but that will change on New Year’s Eve when they host the Colorado Avalanche at Rice-Eccles Stadium.
Most of the outdoor games these days go much smoother than that first one, but that smoothness didn’t come without trial and error. Here are some of the biggest challenges the league’s event crew has faced throughout the years.
2003 Heritage Classic: Too cold
There may have been a bit of overcorrection in the NHL’s second outdoor game (and the first one in the regular season).
Having dealt with melting ice in Las Vegas, the league took its next outdoor venture to one its northernmost city: Edmonton, Alberta in Canada. Not only did it sell out, there were actually more ticket applications than the population of Edmonton at the time.
With wind chill, according to The Weather Network, those fans sat through temperatures of negative 22 degrees Fahrenheit (0°F before wind chill). It was so cold, in fact, that the players hardly checked each other — the two teams combined for just 12 hits all game.
The league ran into a similar issue at the 2022 Winter Classic between the Minnesota Wild and the St. Louis Blues, with a temperature of -6 before wind chill at puck drop. To date, that’s the coldest outdoor game in NHL history.
2011 Winter Classic: Rain
The 2011 Winter Classic was supposed to begin at 1 p.m. local time, but the puck didn’t drop until 8. It was a literal rain check.
The league released a contingency plan in the event the game couldn’t be played in its entirety, which included the possibility of ending the game early and deciding the winner in a shootout ahead of the Pittsburgh Penguins’ next scheduled meeting with the Washington Capitals.
None of that was necessary, though, and the game proceeded that evening.
Besides, nothing could be as bad as the AHL’s Outdoor Classic in 2017.
2014 Winter Classic: Wind and snow
NHL commissioner Gary Bettman “couldn’t be any more pleased” with how the 2014 Winter Classic went. The coaches of the Toronto Maple Leafs and the Detroit Red Wings disagreed.
“I don’t know if you would call it a gem from a pace standpoint,” then-Maple Leafs coach Randy Carlyle said. “There was a lot of snow and a lot of things to deal with.”
Said then-Red Wings coach Mike Babcock: “The conditions made it so some of the skill in the game was eliminated.”
Much of the game featured moderate amounts of snow, coating both the ice and the fans at Michigan Stadium, and strong winds that gave one team a challenge and the other an advantage, depending on the period.
To combat that, the league issued a one-time amendment to a rule: Rather than overtime being played in five uninterrupted minutes, the teams would switch ends at the halfway mark.
Red Wings star Henrik Zetterberg happened to be a step or two away from a partial breakaway when the halfway horn sounded — and as one would imagine, he wasn’t thrilled.
The game required a shootout. All was well until the ice imperfections rendered Tomáš Tatar’s attempt futile as he bobbled the puck all the way down the ice. The Maple Leafs capitalized and won it with the next shot.
NHL Outdoors at Lake Tahoe: Melting ice
After the first period of an outdoor game between the Vegas Golden Knights and the Colorado Avalanche beside Lake Tahoe in 2021, the NHL postponed the rest of the game. Stronger-than-anticipated sunlight was melting the ice.
They resumed the game after dark that evening without any further issues.
The series featured the Boston Bruins and the Philadelphia Flyers on the same the next day. The league postponed that game before it even started, so as to avoid having the same issue.
At both events, the sunlight hitting the ice caused a major glare for those watching on TV — and because this was during the pandemic, the only way to watch the series was on TV.
2019 Winter Classic: Food and beverage shortage
By all accounts, the weather and ice quality were great at Notre Dame Stadium for the 2019 Winter Classic, but problems arose on the concourse.
At the time, Notre Dame did not allow alcohol sales at sporting events. It made an exception for the Winter Classic, but severely underestimated the required quantities.
It wasn’t just beverages, though. Fans online complained about some vendors running out of food, too, which only expanded the lines and wait times of the places that did have food.
Rice-Eccles Stadium (on the campus of the University of Utah) is in a similar position but will make an exception for the 2027 Winter Classic. Learning from 2019, the venue might be best to overstock on beverages and food.
2026 Stadium Series: An unlikely success
The 2026 Stadium series featured a hockey game on a football field, but the best way to describe it uses a baseball term: home run.
Florida isn’t a place most people think of when they talk about outdoor hockey. Many of the stadiums the NHL chooses for its warmer destinations have retractable roofs that the ice crew can utilize when dropping the temperature to make the ice.
Raymond James Stadium, home of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, has nothing of the sort. Instead, the crew constructed a tent over the playing surface and removed it just before game time.
The ice gave no problems, and the game itself was one of the most entertaining in recent memory — outdoors or indoors.
What should fans look forward to for the 2027 Winter Classic?
Although he was a few months shy of his fourth birthday, Mammoth star Logan Cooley has fond memories of the inaugural Winter Classic in 2008.
The Buffalo Sabres pushed Cooley’s hometown Pittsburgh Penguins to a shootout, where a 20-year-old Sidney Crosby scored the game winner through flurries of snow at Ralph Wilson Stadium.
Now, at age 22, Cooley will have the opportunity to participate in a Winter Classic himself — and perhaps inspire local children in a similar way.
“As a kid, you always watch the Winter Classic, especially around the holidays,” he said in an interview at Rice-Eccles Stadium following the game’s announcement in January.
“You always imagine yourself being out there. To be in this position and have the chance to play in the Winter Classic in Utah, with the support of our fans, I’m looking forward to it.”
He tried — and failed — to fight a grin from creeping onto his face when he said he’s hoping for snow.
“I can’t wait. It makes me want to go out and play right now, looking at the field. I’m super excited to do it.”
NHL commissioner Gary Bettman has overseen 46 outdoor games to date. He and his team have learned plenty of lessons along the way, to the point where they have no worries about this one working out well.
“Building the rink here (and) outfitting the stadium, based on the climate, that’s going to be much easier for us than it was it was worrying about whether or not it was going to be 85 degrees with 100% humidity (in Florida),” he said.
