Expansion talk and rumors have been a hot topic as of late, but do the neutral-site locations for the NHL's pre-season schedule hint at potential expansion targets?

Last spring, the movement to bring an NHL hockey team to Utah happened at breakneck speed. But it’s not like the idea of Salt Lake City as an NHL market came out of thin air. 

On top of having hosted memorable Olympic hockey tournaments on both the men’s and women’s sides in 2002, the Utah capital has also been presenting NHL neutral-site pre-season games for years.

Funnily enough, the one pre-season game that’ll be played at Delta Center this September had originally been booked as a neutral-site contest between the Los Angeles Kings and Vegas Golden Knights, as part of a long-term partnership between the Kings and the Delta Center. 

After the Utah Hockey Club was born, it took the Golden Knights’ spot in the matchup, which is now the club's debut in its new home.

As it turns out, the Kings have a nomadic pre-season ahead, as renovations to Crypto.com Arena will be ongoing right up till opening night.

Last fall, they ventured all the way to Australia.

This year, they’ll play one home game in Ontario, Cal. on Sept. 28, at the home of their AHL affiliate. Their other two 'home' contests will be more than 3,000 miles away, in what Adam Proteau of The Hockey News said: “could be the emotional favorite to get an expansion team: Quebec City.”

Situated in Canada’s second-most-populous province, the Quebec capital has been trying to follow in Winnipeg’s footsteps and revive the NHL franchise that it lost in the mid-90s. In 2011, the city and the province joined forces to fund a new state-of-the-art arena, which opened in 2015.

That same year, telecommunications company Quebecor applied for an expansion franchise at the same time as Vegas. But only Bill Foley’s bid to bring hockey to the desert was accepted by the league. 

For nearly a decade, the Videotron Centre has served as a palatial home to the QMJHL’s Quebec Remparts and to the Quebec International Pee-Wee Hockey Tournament each February. Soon, NHL teams will set foot on that ice for the first time when the Kings host the Boston Bruins on Oct. 3 and the Florida Panthers on Oct. 5.

As part of the Kings' agreement to set up camp in Quebec City from Oct. 2-6, event organizing company Gestev, a property of Quebecor, will receive a provincial government subsidy of between $5-7 million. Opposition voices were quick to criticize, but this may be the kind of gesture that ultimately re-ignites NHL head-office interest in a market that is passionate and deserving but won’t necessarily deliver the kind of new fans that Gary Bettman and Co. have prioritized when choosing expansion destinations.

Here are the other neutral-site destinations for the NHL's 2024 pre-season. More than one of these markets could also be trying to set the stage for future action:

Sept. 22 - Des Moines, Iowa - Wells Fargo Arena - St. Louis Blues vs. Utah Hockey Club

The capital of Iowa, Des Moines has a population of just over 700,000 in its metro region — small, for an NHL market. 

The Minnesota Wild’s AHL affiliate, the Iowa Wild, regularly draw more than 6,000 fans a game to the 16,000-seat Wells Fargo arena, which is also the home of the NBA G-league Iowa Wolves and indoor football’s Iowa Barnstormers.

Minnesota also hosted the St. Louis Blues in neutral-site pre-season action at Wells Fargo Arena back in 2018. And even though Des Moines isn’t hosting its parent club, right now Iowa looks more like the other AHL-affiliate venues on this year’s schedule than like a true expansion candidate.

Sept. 25 - Orlando, Fla. - Kia Center - Florida Panthers vs. Tampa Bay Lightning

Florida's population of 22 million is about the size of Ontario and Quebec combined. 

Now that the Stanley Cup has lived in the Sunshine State for three of the last five seasons and both the Panthers and Lightning are regularly selling out their games, it would be on brand for the NHL to consider adding another franchise to the lucrative and populous region.

Kia Center opened in 2010, seats 20,000 and is currently the home of the NBA's Orlando Magic, arena football’s Orlando Predators and the Orlando Solar Bears of the ECHL — who outdrew the Iowa Wild with more than 6,600 fans a game in 2023-24.

Orlando hosted several games for both the Lightning and the Panthers back in the early 90s when those franchises were mere babies. 

The Solar Bears are currently the Lightning’s ECHL affiliate. They've also hosted Battle of Florida pre-season games in 2021 (a 3-2 win for the Panthers) and 2023 (a 2-0 win for the Lightning).

Sept. 25 - Abbotsford, B.C. - Abbotsford Center - Calgary Flames vs. Vancouver Canucks

It’s not quite NHL expansion, but after the Vancouver Canucks beat the Ottawa Senators 6-4 in a neutral-site pre-season game at the Abbotsford Center in 2019, the wheels started to spin a little harder toward moving their AHL affiliate west from its then-home in Utica, N.Y.

The Abbotsford Canucks were born in the fall of 2021, and the NHL Canucks helped welcome the team to the 7,000-seat Abbotsford Center with a 4-2 pre-season win over the Calgary Flames. 

In 2022, stars like Connor McDavid, Quinn Hughes and Elias Pettersson all suited up for a crowd-pleasing 5-4 win for Vancouver over the Edmonton Oilers. But in 2023, the hype level was more muted when Joey Daccord out-duelled Casey DeSmith in a 2-1 win for the Seattle Kraken.

Oct. 5 - Milwaukee, Wis. - Fiserv Forum - Chicago Blackhawks vs. St. Louis Blues.

This is a juicy one — a spicy rivalry taking place in a city that has a strong hockey base. Milwaukee’s metro area has a population of 1.5 million. Fiserv Forum is a shiny, six-year-old arena that seats over 15,000 for hockey and is home to the NBA’s Milwaukee Bucks.

Wisconsin is a college hockey powerhouse on both the men’s and women’s sides and has delivered a steady string of NHL players including Joe Pavelski, Phil Kessel, Ryan Suter, Jake McCabe and Cole Caufield.

The AHL’s Milwaukee Admirals also have a solid foothold in the city, playing out of a nearly 13,000-seat arena that’s also home to college basketball.

In 2022, the Blackhawks dropped a 3-0 decision to the Minnesota Wild in their first-ever visit to Fiserv Forum. That was the first time the NHL had paid a visit to Milwaukee since 1993, so it’s another market that could be trying to draw attention to itself ahead of a possible future expansion bid.

Two other pre-season games are technically being played at neutral sites: the Buffalo Sabres vs. Red Bull Munich in Germany on Sept. 27 and Ottawa vs. Pittsburgh at the Sudbury Community Arena as part of Kraft Hockeyville on Sept. 29. 

Due to a scheduling conflict at Delta Center, Utah will close out its pre-season against the Colorado Avalanche in the Salt Lake City suburb of West Valley City. The 12,000-seat Maverik Center is home to the ECHL’s Utah Grizzlies.