Buffalo, N.Y. (WGR Sports Radio 550) - The Buffalo Sabres and KeyBank announced on Wednesday a 10-year extension of the arena’s naming rights. This means it will remain the KeyBank Center through the 2035-36 season of hockey.
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Erie County Executive Mark Polancarz and Sabres' Chief Operating Officer Pete Guelli were both part of Wednesday's ceremony.
The topic of the lease and an extension came up, as did where the Sabres are at with improvements to the arena.
"When I came in, Terry [Pegula] and I talked about the future of the arena and what we wanted to do," said Guelli following Wednesday's ceremony. "He's invested every year, last year we put the new scoreboard in, put the new roof on. We've got some things that we're not quite ready to announce today that we've done over the summer as well that are coming up, and now we're also looking at the long-term future of the arena."
As owner of the team, Pegula is responsible for all the costs of arena improvements. Guelli says he’s had talks to try to help with that.
"We've talked to the state, we've talked to the county. We're kind of in preliminary discussions there. We're trying to map out the long term plan, and they'll be a part of whatever we do," Guelli noted.
As someone that has been in every building in the National Hockey League except one, I can tell you the seats, which have never been replaced, are, by far, in the worst shape in the league. Guelli says it’s something that could be coming soon.
"It's definitely on the radar," Guelli admitted. "There's a number of things that we know our fans are interested in. One of them is the seats. Just candidly, one of the things we're waiting on is trying to determine, what are we doing long-term before we go in and put in a whole new swath of brand new seats. It doesn't make as much sense until we understand what we're doing with the building long-term, but it's something that's definitely on the radar."
Not having the playoffs in Buffalo for 14 years has caused a severe dip in attendance, and the support the team gets. Guelli knows it’s up to the organization to change things.
"It's something we need to work on," he said. "We still had relatively full buildings all year, despite some people are disappointed on where we're currently at. But I'm confident that if we turn things around, like we expect to on the ice, that everyone will be back in the arena, and this will be the home ice advantage that we need."
Guelli says season tickets currently hover at around 9,000, and he expects to be about that number when the season starts in October. Ideally, the Sabres would love to see that total over 10,000, with 12,000 being considered a sweet spot.
"There's all kinds of group sales opportunities or individual game sales opportunities, there's options on types of tickets that people can buy. So it's not just about Season Tickets. It's about putting plans together to get as many people in here on a nightly basis as you can," Guelli noted.
As far as the lease is concerned, it’s been extended for right now, but Guelli says there are a number of ways where this could go.
"I think we're in a great place, relative to the lease. There's a lot of optionality there," he said. "Right now, we could just move forward and it's going to roll over for another five years. Our goal is to make sure this team is here long-term and well-situated. We think this building is a catalyst for growth in Downtown Buffalo. That's why we're trying to program it as many nights a year as we possibly can."
Guelli is confident he’ll find a path with Erie County going forward.
As far as the Sabres' offseason, Guelli didn’t say how ownership feels, but he did talk about what his thoughts are about the offseason.
We all sat down with Kevyn [Adams] at the end of the season and talked about what the future might be, and I think you've seen a series of moves," Guelli said. "Bringing in Jarmo [Kekalainen] was big for us. He's got a high level of experience, I think he's going to be a great addition to the team. Making some moves on the strength and conditioning side, bringing in Eric Staal, and then we made a number of on the ice moves as well. We needed to get better defensively, and we think we did. Look, until we drop the puck, it's always hard to say how things are gonna work out. But we can't wait until October and we're playing hockey."
Meanwhile, Polancarz says the county does want to get out of the arena business, but he doesn’t expect that to happen by October. He also says there is no danger of the Sabres moving out of town.