Roller hockey league gives Vegas team another shot

Tim Graham

Tuesday, March 16, 1999 | 10:56 a.m.

This time, they claim, it will be different.

The Las Vegas Coyotes on Monday formally announced their entry in the resurrection of Roller Hockey International.

The Coyotes, who moved from Oklahoma City two years ago, will play their 13-game home schedule at the Santa Fe, where the Ice Arena's surface will be covered and the seating capacity expanded to around 2,000. The home opener is June 27 vs. San Jose.

When RHI action resumes this summer after a one-year, financially induced hiatus, it will mark the second time Las Vegas has tried to succeed in the league. The Las Vegas Flash lasted only the 1994 season before folding.

And the Flash wasn't the only professional team in the past decade to discover Las Vegas wasn't a fruitful market. Teams from the Canadian Football League, Arena Football League, World Basketball League and Continental Indoor Soccer League also failed.

"All of those teams," Coyotes co-owner Mike Talkington said, "came in on a short fuse and before their leagues were established.

"Everyone who starts a league wants to come in and immediately be top-level, like the NHL or NFL. We know we can't be that."

RHI started in 1993 with 12 franchises but doubled the next year. The outrageous growth threw the league out of whack and eventually forced the one-year layoff.

"The growth was totally out of control to the point the economic outlook was unfavorable," RHI commissioner Ralph Backstrom, an NHL Hall of Famer, said.

When play resumes in June there will be only 10 teams. RHI will be partially funded through its five-year television agreement with Fox Sports Net. Two Coyotes games will be broadcast live from the Santa Fe.

Former Thunder coach Chris McSorley will lead the Coyotes. McSorley is no stranger to the RHI. The man referred to in press materials as "the Scotty Bowman of in-line" hockey won RHI titles with the Anaheim Bullfrogs in 1993 and the Buffalo Stampede in 1994.

The RHI draft, conducted March 2, assigned 25 players to Las Vegas, although none are obligated to suit up. The Coyotes' roster could have a distinct local flavor with current Thunder wingers Sean Wansborough and Peter Zurba and goaltender Konstantin Simchuk.

"My team will play with fearlessness and unmatched relentlessness," McSorley said. "I promise the fans will be sitting on the edge of their seats. I'll make sure we have a contender."

The average ticket price is $8 with the target audience being in-line skating kids and their families.