The Coquitlam Express is sticking around.
The BC Hockey League (BCHL) team announced an extension of its contract with the city to use the facilities at the Poirier Sport and Leisure Complex through 2029.
Fayaz Manji, the owner and president of the Express, said the arena has been the team’s “home and heart for many years, and we’re proud to be here for many more years.”
Express general manager Tali Campbell said the agreement cements the team’s “unwavering commitment” to its fans and the community.
Manji, a Burnaby-based hotelier, acquired the Express in 2019 and immediately negotiated a five-year lease extension at Poirier. The team had been previously owned by a group of ex-pat hockey players living abroad.
Manji said at the time he wanted to improve the fan experience, as well as bolster connections with its volunteer, sponsors and minor hockey communities.
“There’s more to it than just the game on the ice,” Manji said. “We can show the community what they really have here.”
The Express was founded in 2001 but had to decamp to Burnaby for five seasons — from 2005 to 2010 — while the old Coquitlam Sports Centre was renovated and enlarged. It was during that period the team won the league and national Junior ‘A” championships in 2006.
Seven years later, the Express again won the Fred Page Cup as champions of the BCHL but finished fourth in the Western Canada Cup to determine the top two teams in British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba which would advance to the Royal Bank Cup national championship.
The Express seemed on another trajectory to post-season success in 2020, winning the Ron Boileau Memorial Trophy as the top team in the BCHL’s regular season and then sweeping the Langley Rivermen in the first round of the playoffs, when Hockey Canada abruptly cancelled all hockey activity across the country due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Under the guidance of Campbell, who was just 25 years old when Manji hired him as the Express general manager and vice-president in 2020, the team has steadily worked to solidify its position in Coquitlam’s sports landscape, building relationships with minor hockey groups and schools as well as ensuring players and team representatives are involved with community events.
“The community outreach part is critical to success,” said Campbell, who also ushered in various programs to take care of players’ physical, mental and emotional well being and reconnected with alumni like retired NHLer Kyle Turris.
In 2023, Campbell also had to navigate the BCHL’s departure from Hockey Canada to operate as an independent league.
That’s meant building an entire system of developmental teams in partnership with School District 43 to provide promising players as young as13 a potential path the junior league and the possibility of attaining scholarships to hockey programs at U.S. colleges while still getting their education.
The change has also brought additional financial pressures to meet newly-established league standards for streaming broadcasts and player facilities that will soon include a new 3,300 sq. ft. training centre and lounge in the Express offices across Poirier Street as well as a new bus for road trips that will now include one journey to Alberta after five teams from the Alberta Junior Hockey League defected to the BCHL last February.
Campbell said since his arrival the team’s operating budget for a season has more than doubled to $3,5 million.
He said the extra costs present a particular challenge to the four BCHL teams operating in the Lower Mainland, where fans have many more options for spending their entertainment dollars and the marketplace is dominated by the NHL’s Vancouver Canucks.
“You have to be creative,” Campbell said. “We have to be able to provide maximum value for fans.”
The effort has paid off though; the Express said attendance last season at Poirier averaged 1,025 fans per game almost double the 548 per game it drew during its last season in Burnaby.
The Express opens its 2024-25 regular season Sept. 20 at Poirier, with a game against the Chilliwack Chiefs.
Coquitlam Express schedule features some new twists https://t.co/YMxfiDkWdK
— Tri-City News (@TriCityNews) July 10, 2024
