The Golden Knights have prioritized making the Las Vegas community feel like part of the organization. They've already hosted a youth spring break street hockey tournament and plan on bringing more fun activities to the Las Vegas valley.
A majority of their initiative is focused on local kids because that is the future of the fan base.
Beyond community activities and player initiatives, Golden Knights Owner Bill Foley is hoping to make the sport of hockey a part of the fabric of youth sports.
During an interview with KTNV Digital at the Golden Knights' head coach introductory press conference, Foley spoke about his ambition to build hockey rinks around the valley and get kids excited about playing hockey.
"We want to be embedded in the local community and part of that is to bring our practice facility, two sheets of ice, into Summerlin. We're going to have our youth programs there; we're already doing outreach to elementary, middle schools and high schools," said Foley.
"The next goal sometime in the first five years is to build two sheets of ice in Henderson, so that Henderson then becomes involved just as involved in our hockey program as Summerlin. With those two sheets in Henderson, we'll have seven sheets of ice in town and kids will not have to travel to play hockey."
Foley also revealed that he's had preliminary talks with the Clark County School District about adding hockey as an official sport in high schools, middle schools and elementary schools (street hockey).
"We're already dealing with Clark County," Foley revealed. "We are already getting access to the high schools, middle schools and elementary schools talking [about] street hockey and youth hockey."
The school district has added girls' flag football and lacrosse over the past decade, so it's not farfetched to think that hockey could be on the horizon.
For the Golden Knights to achieve success on the ice will take years and a great deal of patience but in the community, they are already winners.
