UPDATE: Newfoundland Growlers to play at Coca-Cola Coliseum after getting barred from their arena pending investigation
The home opener scheduled for November 5 now has no home.
Today the Mayor of St. John’s announced that the Newfoundland Growlers, ECHL affiliate of the Toronto Maple Leafs, will not be allowed to play their home games in their usual arena, pending an investigation.
The city, though an entity called St. John’s Sports and Entertainment, owns and manages the arena that has been home to the Growlers since their inception.
In a press release issued by the City of St. John’s on Wednesday morning, Oct. 27, mayor Danny Breen explained that employees of St. John’s Sports and Entertainment Ltd. (SJSE), “have brought forward allegations of disrespectful workplace conduct against staff at DSE that must be fully investigated.”
No details have been released beyond the statement that access to the arena is suspended. While the Growlers are owned by Dean MacDonald of Deacon Sports and Entertainment, the Maple Leafs’ Ryan Hardy is the GM of the Marlies and the Growlers, and Laurence Gilman, AGM of the Leafs, is the official ECHL governor for the Growlers.
UPDATE
Gilman announced in a statement that the Growlers will leave Newfoundland and play at Coca-Cola Coliseum for the time being.
The Growlers have a six-game homestand from Nov 5th to Nov 14th. Funnily enough, the Marlies are on the road during the exact same time period (Nov 5th to 14th). December 4th is the first game where there will be an overlap in home games for the Marlies and Growlers. So the Growlers and Leafs have time to work with.
In a statement, Maple Leafs Assistant GM Laurence Gilman says the organization will look to host the Growlers temporarily at Coca-Cola Coliseum in Toronto (where the AHL Marlies play) until a resolution can be found https://t.co/KBEDdkHhMk
— Lukas Wall (@LukasWallCBC) October 27, 2021
Previously the Growlers announced they were unable to sell tickets to the home games, their first games since the spring of 2020. The Growlers did not participate in the 2020-2021 season.
This comes after a period of protracted disagreement between MacDonald and SJSE over the management of the arena and the future of the Growlers. Deacon owns the new Canadiens ECHL franchise in Trois-Rivières and the new team in Iowa, the affiliate of the Wild. Deacon tried to make a deal to manage the Mile One Centre (soon to be renamed to a new corporate sponsor) in St. John’s but that fell through.
MacDonald made headlines this week as he Tweeted out hints while visiting his other teams that he was planning to build a new arena in St. John’s and move the team there.
To that end, Deacon is planning the construction of its own arena complex in the metro St. John’s area. Without revealing any specifics, a source outside the organization says “this is a lot further along than most people realize.”
At this time the nature of the workplace conduct under investigation is not known. The city has provided no timeline for a resolution.
It appears that the Growlers will need an alternate venue for their season, at least to start. Previous Leafs/Marlies/Growlers training camps have used rinks in Mount Pearl and Paradise for events, so expect the Growlers to not go very far.