My Dream Expansion Team: The Saskatoon Muskrats

I am taking it upon myself to live out my hockey GM dreams by creating my own dream expansion team equipped with location, jersey designs, and drafted players.

With the most recent expansion team success being Vegas’ Stanley Cup win after 6 “excruciating” years, and the slight improvement of the Seattle Kraken, it’s time for me to dip my toes into the hockey GM waters and attempt to create my own dream expansion team. This article will include the whole dream pitch including a name, location, roster, jersey concept design, and maybe some predictions. This is all in good fun so buckle up and enjoy the ride.

Location

Any good expansion team is reliant on its location. The easiest way to ensure steady money flow is putting it where hockey is popular, i.e. Canada. If you want to follow in Gary Bettman’s footsteps, maybe you would put a hockey team in an unconventional market, a desert, for example. But me? I want to put a team where I know it won’t fail. Enter the only Canadian province with no NHL team: Saskatchewan.

U.S. hockey? Been there done that. The last NHL team to expand to Canada was the Winnipeg Jets relocating from the now defunct Atlanta Thrashers. Quebec City? No, thanks. You can’t force rivalries. Those come about naturally with animosity and a location close enough to set people apart: New Jersey vs. New York, Calgary vs. Edmonton, etc. The closest team to Saskatchewan? The Winnipeg Jets. A perfect rivalry between a team trying to prove their worth, and a fresh start in central Canada. The Jets’ closest rival is Calgary but why have that when they’re already natural rivals with Edmonton? Hence why Saskatchewan is a perfect location to build a rivalry.

Talks of an expansion team in Saskatchewan have been held in the past, but were squashed by reports that the market and the population is too small to maintain a loyal fanbase, let alone keeping money flowing to the team. But ignoring the thoughts of Gary Bettman (money is everything) doesn’t the population of Saskatchewan deserve a NHL team? I mean their closest bet is Winnipeg after all which is just sad when you think about it. They have junior hockey leagues but that’s not much to scoff at. The two largest cities in Saskatchewan are Regina and Saskatoon. Regina houses the Regina Pats who notably house the up and coming generational talent Connor Bedard, and Saskatoon houses the Saskatoon Blades who have both been around since the 1960s and 70s respectively. Showing that hockey teams can be maintained and successful in Saskatchewan, albeit minor junior league teams. Regina having a (as of 2017) population of 228,928 people and Saskatoon having a (as of 2017) 273,010 population, both of these cities can easily house an NHL sized arena, and are nowhere near as small as the Arizona Coyotes location of Glendale, AZ for example with a population of 248,325 people as of 2020. Although keeping an NHL team in an American desert is much harder than keeping an NHL team in an already hockey loving country and province. Therefore, an NHL team should theoretically easily be maintainable in Saskatchewan. The final location for one in this scenario will be Saskatoon as it is the largest city in Saskatchewan.

Team Name

Not wanting to be too creative, I researched animals native to Saskatchewan and landed on an unconventional choice: The Saskatoon Muskrats. Ironically, muskrats cause a lot of damage in rural Saskatchewan, harming roads, dams, and other infrastructure. Making this expansion team one to be feared. Muskrats are semi-aquatic mammals close resembling beavers and otters. However, those names were already taken and were frankly a little boring. So, an expansion NHL team was born.

Jersey Design Concepts

Home jersey concept

Away jersey concept

Before you ask yourself “Why the hell did you pick those colors?” hear me out. The logo is a standard clipart design of a muskrat with the green, yellow, and purple colors of the Saskatoon flag where the team is based.

Therefore, the color choices and pattern of the jerseys all make perfect sense although the real life version of this design can’t be replicated from the online jersey design creator I used.

Team Roster

Using AI, I’ll generate a full roster for the Saskatoon Muskrats. We have a little bit of everything.

Forwards:

1. Auston Matthews

2. Nathan MacKinnon

3. Brad Marchand

4. Elias Pettersson

5. Sebastian Aho

6. Evgeni Malkin

7. Johnny Gaudreau

8. Aleksander Barkov

9. Jack Eichel

10. Mark Stone

11. William Nylander

12. Taylor Hall

13. Logan Couture

14. Gabriel Landeskog

15. Nikolaj Ehlers

16. Jonathan Huberdeau

17. David Pastrnak

18. Filip Forsberg

19. Vincent Trocheck

20. Patrik Laine

Defensemen:

1. Victor Hedman

2. Roman Josi

3. Cale Makar

4. Dougie Hamilton

5. Seth Jones

6. John Carlson

7. Alex Pietrangelo

8. Morgan Rielly

9. Shea Theodore

10. Zach Werenski

Goaltenders:

1. Igor Shesterkin

2. Connor Hellebuyck

3. Linus Ullmark

And there you have it. My dream expansion team with some quirky pieces. Hope this stirred up your imagination and creativity, as it did mine.