18,000 spectators comfortably seated in the Videotron Center, a National Hockey League (NHL) building.
18,000 hockey fans, real hockey fans like the Old Capital has tens of thousands.
18,000 Nordic orphans. 18,000 dreamers who refuse to give up and who refuse to let the flame go out.
If we can’t dream anymore then what’s the point?
More than 33,000 hockey fans will attend two preparatory games not involving any local team. Not a shadow of a Nordic in the square, apart from the statues surrounding the Videotron Center.
A clear message, a statement: Quebec is undoubtedly the best junior hockey market in Canada and the Remparts the best organization. But Quebec is also ready to sit down at the big table of governors of the best hockey league in the world.
It certainly won’t be via a transfer. There is no more move in sight now that the Coyotes have relocated and the Senators will take up residence in LeBreton Flats.
But the recruitment pool being what it is, extended across the globe, at a time when two of the 25 best players in the world, Tim Stützle and Leon Draisaitl were trained in Germany.
The NHL, the poor relation of North American professional sports, is a league that has a need to find new money and will not be able to remain foreign for long to the prospect of raising five billion dollars through four expansion processes.
And so, in a league with 36 teams, having eight in Canada certainly won’t be too much to ask. Especially since Quebec will not find itself in the bottom third of contributors to the league’s collective fund.
The economic context of the national capital, full employment, the quality of jobs, the desire of people, of hockey fans, everything converges towards the Nordiques who would be an asset for the collective good of the national league.
Quebec better than Ottawa. Quebec better than Winnipeg, better than Calgary and Edmonton. Quebec, which even in Canadian Tire dollars, would do better than at least 18 of the 28 American markets projected for a 36-team NHL.
It’s not me who says it… I dream about it! It is the economic institutes and other financial analysts who maintain it. And sooner or later, the national league will not remain indifferent to this prospect.
And then, we will have to remind ourselves that the measly $5.5 million decreed by the Quebec Minister of Finance will have made its way.
Because the panorama of a full Videotron Center for two American club matches is a strong image, a business card that is intended to be an act of strength to demonstrate the viability of Quebec and its inexhaustible desire to finally reunite with its Nordiques!
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