From The Ground Up: South Names

The five markets with the most votes to be included in the South Division of our fantasy hockey league are final. Over 4,000 individual votes were cast in the poll.

Here, I'm outlining those markets (alphabetically) along with the acceptable locators (listed below) for your team name nominations — which I'll begin accepting today by comment only.

• DALLAS, Texas
  Texas | Dallas | Fort Worth | Irving


• DENVER, Colorado
  Colorado | Denver | Boulder


• HOUSTON, Texas
  Texas | Houston | Beaumont | Galveston


• NEW ORLEANS, Louisiana
  Louisiana | New Orleans | Baton Rouge | Shreveport


• SALT LAKE CITY, Utah
  Utah | Salt Lake City | Salt Lake

DO NOT SUBMIT NAME NOMINATIONS VIA EMAIL. THEY WILL NOT BE ACCEPTED.

Submit your team name nominations by leaving a comment below. Email submissions will be discarded. I will accept nominations for one week at which point new comments on this post will be closed. Up to 20 name submissions that fit within the following parameters will be included in the name selection process which will begin next weekend.

If you want your submission included, DO NOT:
• use any name that has already been selected for this project.
• use the name of any current or past NHL or WHA team.
• use the name of any current AHL or ECHL team.
• use the name or close variation of any current or past professional sports team within the same market or geographical area.
• use the name of any team from Project: IHA.
• use any name that would be considered vulgar, obscene or in any way inappropriate. (Sorry, this is my call.)

If you decide to use a locator not already on the list above, be prepared to have it discarded. I'm not setting that in stone as a restriction, but I'm also not guaranteeing I'll include anything not on the list. Sorry for all the restrictions but sometimes you have to "guide" originality.

It was suggested that when submitting names you also submit a short reasoning for that name. I won't require that but I will recommend it since it might help your submission get votes later on if folks know where you got your idea.

Don't forget to make your submissions for the Southeast Division. You have until September 27.

Start submitting!

Blues Unveil Third Jersey!

Today, the St. Louis Blues became the fourth team to unveil their third jersey for the 2008-09 season.

The team posted a photo gallery on their official web site shortly after the unveiling ceremony at FANfest. It features Brad Boyes wearing his brand new sweater.



Below you can see shot of the complete uniform and a close-up of the crest — a new logo featuring the iconic Gateway Arch.



From what I can tell, they kept the same pants but got new socks to match these sweaters. They've also dropped the lighter blue from their color scheme for this jersey. They have a very classic yet not retro feel to them.



The third jersey features the same numbering and lettering style as the regular home and road jerseys.



For what it's worth, it looks like the sneak peek I posted yesterday was dead on — just really terrible quality.

To the right you can check out the full photo gallery which now includes several pictures sent to me by folks who attended today's FANfest in St. Louis where the jersey was unveiled and on display.

As with all of the photo galleries, I'll add game action photos when the jerseys finally hit the ice.

Icethetics Live Chat V

Live Chat Time Change

All right guys, I'm going to give the Live Chat another chance today. I've changed the time to 12:30 PM EDT.

According to the Blues' official web site, the third jersey unveiling will take place at 1 PM (noon, locally). It will not be streamed online like the Sabres and Hurricanes events were. However, they say there will be pictures posted on the site as soon as the jersey is unveiled. And I figured if we get things started at 12:30 it'll give me time to take some of the questions and comments I was unable to get to yesterday.

So, a lot is going on this weekend. I'm working on getting the next step of the fantasy league set up. In the meantime, I updated the Sabres' third jersey unveiling post from yesterday. I just added new pictures from the team's web site and the wires. Much better quality than the screen grabs from the live stream that I was using.

I kept an eye on some of the other fan events that were going on around the league as well. The Coyotes, Senators and Blackhawks all still have their new third jerseys under wraps. Nothing was unveiled or on display at these events — that I know of. If I missed something, please let me know.

I'll add the Live Chat window at about 12:15 PM EDT.

Sneak Peek At Blues Alternate

I got an email from a reader earlier claiming to have scans of all of the new third jerseys. He's sent along what he says is the St. Louis Blues' new sweater. I can't say one way or another whether it's legitimate, but what could it hurt to share it?

We'll see the real thing tomorrow straight from the source anyway. So here's what was sent to me.



It's terrible quality. Nothing I can do about that, I guess. But if you squint and sort of tilt your head you can kind of make out the logo on the front. It's a white circle with the Blue Note and the Gateway Arch over it. It could also be the Virgin Mary.

Anyway, just a little something for you while we wait for the Blues to show us the actual jersey.

Sabres Unveil Third Jersey!

After weeks of speculation, the Buffalo Sabres have officially unveiled their new third jersey. The team broadcast the unveiling ceremony live on their web site.

They also made the official announcement of the new sweaters with this graphic.



The ceremony, which began after a team scrimmage, featured each member of the team stepping out onto the ice in the new sweater. Ryan Miller got things started, giving fans their very first look at the new duds.



It's a great redesign of their classic look — with an update of the logo and blue uniform.

We got a decent look at the full uniform when Maxim Afinogenov and Drew Stafford stepped out. You can see the Sabres will keep the sweater number on the front shoulder and add new socks to match the jersey.



You'll also notice a silver area under the arms in this picture of Teppo Numminen. They're very sharp jerseys.



Once everyone was out there, the players skated a few laps around the ice and waved goodbye to fans.



The Sabres had the following statement regarding the new sweaters on their web site.

Utilizing the original crest from the 1970s, the logo has undergone minor modifications for an overall vintage appearance.

“The first thing we wanted to do is go to our new color scheme, which is the deeper blue and gold,” said Director of Creative Services, Frank Cravotta. “After that we added the striping pattern, introduced some silver accents in it and put some silver vertical piping along the front… It makes for a new and unique look.”

The jersey also encompasses a tie at the collar to “reinforce the retro style,” according to Cravotta.

I couldn't agree more with Cravotta's statement. And to every person saying the vertical piping is "unnecessary"... can you please define what is necessary outside of a uniform that identifies a group of players as teammates? Stuff like that has me in stitches.

I've set up a photo gallery for the Sabres' third jersey. Right now, it's made up primarily of screenshots from the live broadcast of the event on Sabres TV. I'll add more images when they're available.

If I hear anything else or see any better photos of these sweaters, I'll be sure to keep you updated.

Icethetics Live Chat IV

(10:58 AM) Sorry about the Live Chat failure today, guys. Not sure what it was. Combination of my crappy internet service provider — Comcast, under the bus — and other things kept me from being able to run the Live Chat the way I usually do. I guess it had to happen sometime. Hopefully we won't be in as bad of shape tomorrow for the Blues.

Sabres To Stream Unveiling

Just like the Hurricanes did, the Buffalo Sabres will be streaming live video of their third jersey unveiling today at 10:30 from their official web site.

That means we'll all get to watch the unveiling ceremony as it happens this morning. So just like last time, I recommend having two browser windows open — one with the live video and the other with today's Icethetics Live Chat which starts at 10.