Denver Spurs



The Denver Spurs were a professional team based out of Denver, Colorado. The Spurs began play in the Western Hockey League in 1968, and played at the Denver Coliseum. The Spurs became the first professional sports team in Colorado to win a championship in 1971–72. After the WHL folded in 1974, the team transferred to the Central Hockey League for the 1974–75 season.

Spurs in the WHA
The WHA elected to expand to Denver for the 1975–76 season, following the National Hockey League's cancellation of a proposed 1976 expansion to Denver and Seattle. The move to the WHA also meant a move to the McNichols Sports Arena. The WHA Spurs are sometimes considered as a continuation of the Chicago Cougars, who had folded following the 1974-75 season, as most of the team's players were claimed from the Cougars in a dispersal draft, combined with some players from the CHL Spurs.

The Spurs entered the World Hockey Association for the 1975–76 season. A Sports Illustrated preview on the upcoming WHA season noted it was stalwart Gordie Howe's 29th year in major league hockey, and the Spurs' first. The magazine picked the expansion team to finish last in the WHA's Western Division and ominously predicted that Denver's time in the big leagues "may turn out to be 28 years less than Gordie's."

Veteran Ralph Backstrom was one of the Spurs' few experienced players, but at 38 his career was in decline, still, he wound up leading the team with 50 points in 41 games. The rest of the roster was filled with cast-offs and career minor-leaguers, such as Don Borgeson, who had played for the WHL Spurs from 1971-73; he finished second to Backstrom in points scored with 41.

By December 30, they were in the Western Division cellar with a 13–20–1 mark, despite an overtime win over the Indianapolis Racers that night in Denver. It would turn out to be the last game the Spurs would play in Colorado.

Fans in the area had been banking on an NHL team, and did not consider the WHA to be a major league. As a result, the team drew poorly, with an average attendance of less than 3,000 per game in their 16,800-seat arena. Amid ongoing rumors that an NHL team (either the Kansas City Scouts or California Golden Seals) was planning to relocate to Denver, Spurs owner Ike Mullenix sold the team to a group of Canadian businessmen in the middle of the season. They quietly moved the team to Ottawa on January 2, 1976, where the team was renamed Ottawa Civics. The Civics themselves would only survive for another two weeks before the franchise folded for good.

The hastily arranged move is hockey legend, as the players, who were on the road reportedly only learned of the move to Ottawa when they stood on the ice for their next road game (in their Denver colors) and suddenly heard O Canada being played.

Season-by-season Record

 * 1968–74 – Western Hockey League
 * 1974–75 – Central Hockey League
 * 1975–76 – World Hockey Association

Note: GP = Games played, W = Wins, L = Losses, T = Ties, Pts = Points, GF = Goals for, GA = Goals against, PIM = Penalties in minutes