Another NHL-ECHL partnership has been announced, this time with the Arizona Coyotes and the Atlanta Gladiators. Per the Coyotes’ announcement, the Gladiators will serve as the team’s ECHL affiliate for the 2022-23 season. Coyotes GM Bill Armstrong gave the following statement regarding the partnership:
We are very pleased to once again partner with the Atlanta Gladiators as our new ECHL affiliate. The Gladiators are a first-class organization with a loyal and passionate fan base. We look forward to working with Gladiators President Jerry James and Head Coach Jeff Pyle this season.
This news marks the second time the Coyotes have partnered with the Gladiators as their ECHL affiliate. Atlanta was previously the Coyotes’ ECHL farm team from 2011-2015.
The ECHL isn’t a place where NHL clubs typically prefer to send their prospects to develop, but that doesn’t mean that these affiliation agreements aren’t notable. Goalies in particular most often find themselves getting game action at the ECHL level, and experienced netminders such as Philipp Grubauer and Jonathan Quick saw their first professional action in North American professional hockey’s third-tier league.
Assuming netminder Jon Gilles wins the job as backup to Karel Vejmelka in Arizona, (which is far from certain, of course) the Coyotes could opt to have 22-year-old prospect goalie David Tendeck work as the starter in Atlanta rather than see the ice less often as Ivan Prosvetov’s backup in AHL Tucson.
Their NHL roster is basically and ECHL roster so who are they going to pick up to fill the roster Sean Avery lol
So…which arena has larger capacity?
@acLA – Well, according to the website for Gas South Arena, it’s 13K, so you know what that means…
It is always hilarious hearing the same joke over and over and over and over and over and over. Genius.
Coyotes made the change because Rapid City dump them. You need prospects to fill the pipeline and the coyotes didn’t have prospects to support an ECHL team. And they still don’t. Contrary to what the local media will tell you the Coyotes have a big hole still to get out of. Their Stadium issues are real, in what is still largely a gate driven league, on top of that the local fan base is having issue digesting new ticket prices also. I don’t see the support of Atlanta being any different than what Rapid City endured the last 3 years