by Julie Diaz

Created on: February 26, 2008

You may ask what can the NHL do to recruit American players. Believe it or not, the NHL has already started the programs that will lead to more American players being recruited. When the NHL started their expansion to "non-hockey" cities such as Los Angeles and St. Louis, hockey began to grow in those cities. But hockey was still considered a cold climate sport in most of the United States until the early 1990s when NHL hockey was introduced to the most unlikely states of Texas and Florida. With these moves hockey was introduced to large groups of people who had no hockey knowledge or skills. Being the sports fanatics that these states are, hockey was embraced by many. Also, many transplanted Northerners were ecstatic that hockey had finally come to them.

When the Dallas Stars moved to Texas there were only a handful of hockey players in the area. After the first season parents began signing up their children for hockey lessons and later forming teams. The problem was that there were few ice rinks in which to play. The Dallas Stars organization started building ice rinks throughout the area to introduce skating and hockey to more people. They began a youth hockey program to fill the growing need for competitive hockey leagues. Today there are 1000s of youth playing hockey in the Dallas area. In fact, in the 2007 NHL draft, the first Dallas born player was drafted (14 years after the Stars moved to Dallas). This 18 year old grew up in the Dallas Stars Youth Hockey organization. Don't forget that in this same draft the first two draft picks were American players.

This phenomenon is occurring throughout the United States. In all the NHL cities there are similar programs to the Dallas Stars Youth Hockey program. Then there are the "farm teams" for the NHL in the American Hockey League in Norfolk, VA, Houston, San Antonio, and Des Moines. These cities are not exactly hockey hotbeds. Add to that the East Coast Hockey League with teams in Georgia, Florida, Idaho, California, Utah, West Texas, Mississippi, North and South Carolina and Las Vegas and you've got hockey in even more areas that were previously unfamiliar with hockey. As more and more kids are introduced to the exciting game of hockey there will be more Americans in the NHL.

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