{"id":350506,"date":"2026-06-25T21:27:17","date_gmt":"2026-06-25T21:27:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/350506\/"},"modified":"2026-06-25T21:27:17","modified_gmt":"2026-06-25T21:27:17","slug":"will-the-nhl-come-to-austin-or-houston","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/350506\/","title":{"rendered":"Will the NHL Come to Austin or Houston?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Texas billionaire Dan Friedkin is looking to bring a second National Hockey League franchise to the Lone Star State, in either its capitol or Space City.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Pursuit Sports, Friedkin\u2019s ownership and operating platform, struck a deal with the NHL to expand the league in either Houston or Austin, according to the San Antonio Business Journal<\/a>. The state already has one NHL franchise: the Dallas Stars, who are in the process of moving from Downtown Dallas to suburban Plano.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Friedkin is no stranger to the sports business, but his expertise is across the pond. In 2019, he purchased Italian Serie A football club AS Roma, and gained majority ownership of English Premier League club Everton in 2024.\u00a0<\/p>\n

As the negotiations continue, where exactly could the franchise host its matches? If Austin is selected, there\u2019s an option that would jump at the chance to host NHL games: The H-E-B Center at Cedar Park.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Texas Stars, the Dallas Stars\u2019 affiliate in the American Hockey League, already play their home games at the stadium. The H-E-B Center is also the home of the San Antonio Spurs\u2019 G-League affiliate, the Austin Spurs. There\u2019s precedent for a bespoke stadium as well: San Francisco-based architecture firm Gensler and Austin Commercial opened the 20,500 seat, $260 million Q2 Stadium<\/a> for Major League Soccer franchise Austin FC in 2021.\u00a0<\/p>\n

If Houston is selected, there\u2019s options as well. The Houston Rockets are undergoing a sweeping renovation of the Toyota Center<\/a> set to be completed by fall 2027, and NRG Park<\/a> is famous for hosting a wide variety<\/a> of events, including Houston Texans games and the Houston Rodeo.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Toyota Center could be particularly enticing, as the prospective NHL franchise could enter into an American Airlines Center-style agreement with the Rockets. The American Airlines Center is owned by the city of Dallas, and through 2031 will host both the Dallas Mavericks and the Dallas Stars.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u2014 Hunter Cooke<\/p>\n

\tRead more
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\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Texas billionaire Dan Friedkin is looking to bring a second National Hockey League franchise to the Lone Star…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":350507,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[132,134,124888,133],"class_list":["post-350506","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-austin","tag-austin","tag-austin-headlines","tag-austin-houston-sports-stadiums","tag-austin-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350506","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=350506"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350506\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/350507"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=350506"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=350506"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=350506"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}