Melnyk speaks out about IceDogs future

Billionaire Eugene Melnyk has finally spoken out about the potential sale of the Mississauga IceDogs. Melnyk, who recently donated $50,000 worth of hockey equipment to Canadian Soldiers in Afghanistan told the Fan590 that things are heating up.

“There’s a lot of activity and we are running out of time for this coming season because they have to put their schedule together and we’ve got a draft coming up in the first week of May,” Melnyk told the Fan590.

“We’ve had a number of different situations developing and they continue to develop in multiple cities and any one can hit at any one time and I’m hoping to get that resolved before the deadline and that deadline is coming up pretty quick.”

But that deadline according to OHL commissioner David Branch has already passed.

OHL commissioner David Branch told the Mississauga News on March 25th that he believes the future of the Mississauga IceDogs may be determined within the next 10 days.

"The window of opportunity (for selling and moving the team) is getting narrower and narrower," David Branch told the Mississauga News.

Frustration

Meantime, Moe Mantha Jr. continues to wait to hear from the OHL or Melnyk’s Capital Sports Management group about the status of their bid.

“We still haven’t heard anything,” said a frustrated Moe Mantha Jr. Saturday morning.

The assistant coach with the AHL’s Rochester Americans officially announced in early December that they had put a bid in to acquire the homeless Mississauga Ice Dogs who went up for sale when Eugene Melnyk purchased the franchise with the intent of moving his current club, The St. Michael’s Majors from downtown Toronto to the Hershey Centre which he purchased as part of the Ice Dogs deal.

After three failed attempts to move the team to Niagara Falls in January and February of this year, the rumour mill seemed to be pointing directly at North Bay as the only viable location for the franchise to re-locate.

Even OHL commissioner David Branch stoked the North Bay Flames on TSN’s “Off the Record” when he named North Bay as the city that most deserved a CHL franchise that didn’t already have one.

Now rumours are circulating of communities like Newmarket, Cornwall, and Flint making legitimate offers for the homeless franchise. Despite those rumours, Mantha Jr. says he hasn’t heard anything regarding another official bid for the franchise.

The question remains if the league allows the IceDogs to remain in Mississauga for one more year will Mantha and his North Bay bid stick around for another 365 days?