David Andrews Teams Quotations

The salary cap in the Collective Bargaining Agreement in the National (Hockey) League now is going to really encourage teams to develop their own talent and to have a lot of young players developing in the AHL. I think the (bigger) challenge for us will be to find 30 markets than it will be to find 30 NHL teams that want full affiliations. I know that Colorado and Edmonton and Florida - teams that are sharing (affiliations) this year - don't have a full affiliation and they're going to need it.

With all 30 NHL teams developing their prospects in our league, the AHL provides an ideal opportunity to evaluate these potential changes, ... We remain committed to assisting the NHL with the growth and development of our sport, and we are confident that this test schedule will allow for a fair assessment of the proposal without compromising the competitive balance of the AHL.

Obviously, we won't be replicating that, but in our own buildings we should continue to do well. We expect another great year in Winnipeg. The loss of the team in Edmonton will hurt but adding the Toronto Marlies helps offset that. We have four new teams in all so we think we very well might hit (7 million) again.

With the new CBA in the NHL, there's a premium on player development, and players being assigned to our teams gives us a lot of dynamic young players. So we expect a banner year competitively.

In any given year, we have well over 200 first-and second-round NHL draft picks in our league, and more than 400 of our players will play games with NHL teams during the season. There's lots of great young talent.