North Eastern Hockey League

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Logo of the NEHL

The North Eastern Hockey League ( NEHL for short ) was an American ice hockey minor league that was founded in 2003 by entrepreneur Jim Cashman , who in addition to his role as coach and captain of the York IceCats . In addition to the Canadian Ligue Nord-Américaine de Hockey , it was considered the lowest professional league in North American ice hockey.

As early as 1978/79 there was a North Eastern Hockey League in the United States, which, however, merged with the Eastern Hockey League after only one season .

On January 23, 2008, the league announced that it would cease playing with immediate effect.

2003/04 season

For the 2003/04 season, the league began with the following teams that competed against each other on weekend game days:

The regular season began in November, one of the strengths of the league was initially that a lot of goals were scored in the games and thus the spectators were drawn. Still, the Poughkeepsie franchise had to move to Connecticut between Christmas and New Years due to a lack of spectators and then renamed Connecticut Cougars .

Two days before the play-offs , the Mohawk Valley Comets, the leaders of the main round, finally announced that they would not be able to participate in the finals due to financial problems, which brought the league to the verge of ruin. The play-off structure also had to be changed at short notice. If, with York and Jamestown, the second and third placed opponents of the Comets were to play out the final opponents, these two teams would now have to play the title among themselves.

In each of the two scheduled finals, one of the two teams won (York - Jamestown 8: 5; 1: 9), in a 20-minute play-off the Jamestown Titans defeated the York IceCats 6: 1 and were the first to receive the Herb Brooks Memorial Trophy as the winner of the North Eastern Hockey League.

2005/06 season

Financial problems forced the league to suspend the game in the 2004/05 season, for the 2005/06 season the league returned as the Continental Professional Hockey League with teams from Canada and the USA.

The regular season should include 44 games and start in November 2005, but in mid-December 2005 this season was also canceled due to economic problems. The four participating teams were:

2006/07 season

For the 2006/07 season, the league returned as the North Eastern Hockey League, the game operations were carried out in a better structured manner, so that this time the season could be carried out without interruption. An all-star game with the best players in the league also took place on March 18 .

The teams for the 2006/07 season were:

2007/08 season

In the last season, which did not end, the following teams competed:

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