Ohio Junior Blue Jackets, RIP

The Junior Blue Jackets are no more. This isn’t especially surprising, given that they struggled even to fill the Dispatch Ice Haus. What’s perhaps surprising is that they came back for a second season in Columbus at all, given what many people consider to be their genesis as a vanity project for Doug MacLean.

I’ll admit that I only made it to one game over the two seasons they were in existence. And I consider myself a pretty serious fan of hockey at all levels, so you can see what they were up against. With plentiful cheap tickets to the Jackets and hockey Buckeyes available, it just doesn’t seem like there was an untapped niche of hockey fans in Columbus for the Junior Jackets, even with all the free tickets on Craigslist, etc. Maybe in a decade or so…