Brampton Battalion moving north
Posted Nov 5, 2012 09:42:20 PM.
This article is more than 5 years old.
A tentative deal has been reached to move the Brampton Battalion franchise north for the start of the 2013-14 OHL season.
A 15-year lease agreement between North Bay and the Battalion needs the league’s Board of Governors approval and is contingent on the community buying in for 2,000 season tickets for a minimum three-year period.
Kitchener Rangers play-by-play announcer Don Cameron said while it looks like a lot more travel for the East Avenue Blue, it sets up the possibility of convenient scheduling, “We would probably end up playing something like Barrie, North Bay and Sudbury all on a particular one circuit situation. You could even combine it another way, North Bay, Sudbury and Sault Ste. Marie.”
Cameron said this is a great move for the team, “Particularly for the players, and particularly for the owner. The owner put all they could into Brampton to try and make it work, they put some pretty competitive teams in there, but somehow, the crowds just didn’t come. For the players, I think they’re going to a city that will embrace the team.”
“I think it’s long over due,” Cameron said, “David Branch and the OHL tried desperately to get the metro-Toronto to support junior hockey, and it just didn’t work out.”
In a release, Battalion owner Scott Abbott says North Bay has a rich hockey history and they hope to add to it. Abbott goes on to says there’s a longstanding association with the military in the community, and it will be a goal of theirs to build a Memorial Cup championship team at Memorial Gardens.
