Arizona Coyotes’ New Mullett Arena Brings Hype, Derision And 2 Opening-Weekend Losses

The next phase of the Arizona Coyotes’ vagabond existence has begun — with a pair of losses.

On Friday night, the Coyotes welcomed the Winnipeg Jets and 4,600 curious fans into their new home in Mullett Arena, on the campus of Arizona State University. They jumped out to a 2-0 lead, but the Jets came back to earn a 3-2 win at the 32-second mark of overtime, on Blake Wheeler’s second goal of the season.

Sunday marked another 3-2 loss — this time in regulation, to the New York Rangers.

Through eight games, the Coyotes sit last in the NHL’s Central Division with a record of 2-5-1. This week, they’ll host the Florida Panthers and the Dallas Stars before heading back out for a 14-game road trip, as the rest of their new building’s amenities are completed.

And yes — the official attendance for each of this weekend’s games was under 5,000 people. And they were sellouts.

But this is the temporary home where the Coyotes plan to play for the next three seasons, at least, as they continue to push toward gaining approval to construct their own full-size arena and entertainment district project a couple of miles down the road in Tempe. With an estimated cost of $1.7 billion, the privately funded project is set to go to a vote before Tempe City Council on Nov. 29.

A more centrally located arena within the Phoenix Metropolitan Area has been a white whale for the Coyotes, almost from the first day the original Winnipeg Jets franchise relocated to the desert in 1996. At first, the team played in America West Arena in downtown Phoenix — a fine home for the NBA’s Phoenix Suns, but not properly equipped to house NHL hockey. Real estate developer Steve Ellman purchased the Coyotes in 2000, with a plan to build a new arena in a shopping complex in centrally located Scottsdale. But the deal fell apart, and the development plan shifted to the northwestern suburb of Glendale — a difficult commute for the small-but-passionate core of hockey fans who mostly live in the eastern part of the region.

In 2003, the Coyotes moved into the Glendale facility, but found themselves in a chicken-and-egg situation. Attendance was low, so money was tight, so the team wasn’t very good. Rinse and repeat. Amid constant rumors of relocation, ownership changed hands. The league even ran the team from 2009 to 2013, after then-owner Jerry Moyes pushed the club into bankruptcy as part of an attempt to sell the franchise and move it to Hamilton, Ontario.

In 2019, current owner Alex Meruelo purchased a majority share in the team for an estimated $300 million. His early tenure was tumultuous, in keeping with the franchise’s history. So when the City of Glendale announced in August of 2021 that it would not be renewing the Coyotes’ lease at Gila River Arena beyond the 2021-22 season, many onlookers assumed that the NHL’s desert days would finally be coming to an end.

But like a phoenix rising from the ashes, so to speak, the Coyotes play on. And for now, players and team personnel are doing their best to put a positive spin on the situation.

That starts with the atmosphere, significantly more raucous than at their old home.

“It’s a fun place to play,” said Fischer, the 25-year-old who is in his seventh season with the Coyotes and scored the first two goals in the new arena last Friday. “It’s great. So much talk about the negativity or the seat size, it’s a cool little fanbase. We’re gonna pack it out.”

And while the Rangers are used to being surrounded by the very best amenities after the recent billion-dollar renovation to their home, Madison Square Garden, winger Alexis Lafreniere spoke positively about his first experience at Mullett Arena on Sunday.

“The ice was really good,” he said. “The building was fun to play in. It was loud, so it was great to play here.”

As part of the Coyotes’ lease agreement with the ASU facility, Meruelo agreed to contribute nearly $20 million in add-ons to bring it up to NHL standards, including an annex that would house both teams’ dressing rooms and training facilities.

The annex is expected to be ready by December — which is why the Coyotes started their season with six road games and will soon head back out for more than a month.

The current homestand is basically a teaser of things to come. But even once the annex is complete, the memory of this temporary dressing room setup in the arena’s adjacent practice rink will linger.

As they’ve struggled to make ends meet throughout their history, the Coyotes have benefitted from the NHL’s revenue-sharing plan. The limited capacity at their new home has caused concern that it will further limit their ability to pull their own weight, financially. But with every ticket except for a designated student section now essentially a premium lower-bowl seat, Coyotes president and CEO Xavier Gutierrez told ESPN in September that this fall’s season-ticket revenue was up by 50% from what “we ever did in the history” of the Glendale arena.

In many ways, the Coyotes’ current situation parallels that of the New York Islanders. They returned to aging, below-standard Nassau Coliseum for a period after their move to Brooklyn didn’t work out, until their new home, UBS Arena, was completed last fall. Undersized by NHL standards, Nassau still had a capacity of nearly 14,000, but the 50-year-old facility also showed its age. Mullett Arena is smaller, but everything is brand new.

For now, it’ll have to do. After defying the odds for more than a quarter century, the Coyotes live on in the desert. If the vote for the Tempe project goes their way next month, they’ll be closer than they’ve ever been to putting down true roots in a challenging-but-enticing hockey market.