The Montreal Canadiens may be venturing into new territory.
It was revealed Wednesday that the National Lacrosse League (NLL), in collaboration with the Montreal Canadiens, will organize a regular season game at Place Bell in the near future.
While there is no exact date set for the game, further details will be announced at an NLL press conference with Commissioner Brett Frood on Thursday at 11 am.
Along with Frood, Vincent Lucier, senior vice-president of sales and development of the Canadiens, and Kurt Hunzeker, executive vice-president of commercial operations of the NLL, will also be present to speak with the media.
There may not be much to go on yet, but if the Canadiens did decide to get involved in lacrosse, it would not be a total mismatch. And with the Las Vegas Desert Dogs joining the NLL this past season, the league currently stands at an odd number of teams and may be willing to add more.
In fact, five out of 15 NLL teams share the same owner as the NHL team in their cities: the Buffalo Bandits, Calgary Roughnecks, Colorado Mammoth, Philadelphia Wings, and Vancouver Warriors.
Despite there being a long history of lacrosse in Quebec, the Bell Centre has not hosted an NLL game since December of 2014, when the Toronto Rock beat the Rochester Knighthawks by a score of 15-7.
But a little over two decades ago, Montreal actually had an NLL franchise of its own — the Montreal Express.
Their first-ever match was quite the event, with the Express defeating the Calgary Roughnecks by a score of 32-17 at the Bell Centre, setting an NLL record for most goals scored by one team.
After playing out their inaugural season in 2002, the team was inactive for the next two years. It was subsequently returned to the league in 2004. The NLL sold the rights to the franchise to the Minnesota Swarm for the 2005 season.
Those looking to tune into Thursday’s press conference can do so on the NLL’s YouTube channel.
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