The Utah Hockey Club has narrowed down the options for its permanent nickname to three and is giving fans the opportunity to choose the winning candidate.
Smith Entertainment Group announced Wednesday that the three finalists are the Utah Hockey Club, the Utah Mammoth and the Utah Wasatch. Fans at Utah’s next four home games, beginning against the Pittsburgh Penguins on Wednesday (9:30 p.m. ET; SN-PIT, MAX, truTV, TNT, SN360, TVAS), will be able to vote at iPad stations set up throughout Delta Center.
Fans will select from the three names and two potential logos — one logo that would accompany Hockey Club and Wasatch and the other linked to Mammoth.
“The voting at this stage of the process will only be done in-arena.” Smith Entertainment Group executive Mike Maughan said. “We’re doing that because this time we’re including names and potential logos with them. … Because of the logos, we’re doing this only in-arena and not showing those publicly so that we can protect those images.”
Utah plans to announce the winning name and logo at a time to be determined following the end of this season and before the start of next season. Hockey Club was the name selected for Utah’s inaugural NHL season after co-owners Ryan and Ashley Smith purchased the contracts of Arizona Coyotes executives, coaches and players.
Fan voting will also be conducted at Utah’s home games against the Columbus Blue Jackets on Friday, St. Louis Blues on Sunday and Philadelphia Flyers on Tuesday. Maughan estimated Utah will have approximately 15,000 fans at the each of the four home games who will have the opportunity to vote.
Maughan said it is to be determined whether there will be another stage needed after this one to select the winning name and logo, but, ultimately, the fans will have the final say because Ryan and Ashley Smith see the team as “a community asset.”
“[The Smiths] view this as a really exciting opportunity to do something that has never been done in the history of professional sports, which is involve fans to this level and go with them through this entire process as we seek to name a team together,” Maughan said. “That’s what we’re very excited about. They are very community-focused and community-oriented people, and we’re excited to be able to announce this next stage of the process where we’ll be working with everybody on the naming of the team.”
The fan survey will be run utilizing methodology provided by Qualtrics, an experience management company that Ryan Smith co-founded. The same process was used to select the “Mountain Basketball” uniforms worn the Utah Jazz NBA team.
This is the fourth stage of fan involvement, which began with an open invitation for suggestions. Those suggestions were narrowed down by voting to the top 20 and, subsequently, the top six. Hockey Club and Mammoth are the remaining names from voting on that top six. Wasatch is a new submission in place of Yeti.
Utah decided to move on from Yeti after being unable to reach a coexistence agreement with Yeti cooler company, which Maughan said has, “a unique and strong trademark on anything published ‘Yeti’ or ‘Yetis’, either the singular or the plural … on clothing or any other licensed gear.”
The name Wasatch is in tribute to the Wasatch Mountains that run from the Utah-Idaho border south to central Utah.
“Eighty-five percent of Utahans live within 15 miles of what is called the Wasatch Front, this mountain range,” Maughan said. “So, it is allowing us to honor this idea of a mythical snow creature, but with a very Utah-centric approach to it.”
The logo that would accompany the Hockey Club and Wasatch names is a depiction of that mythical snow creature. The Mammoth name is linked to a logo with an illustration of a mammoth.
“All of them are designed in a very fierce and appropriate way for an NHL hockey team,” Maughan said.
During the survey, fans will be able to choose from different combinations of the names and associated logos, including what they would look like on jerseys and on the ice.
Although the United States Patent and Trademark Office rejected submissions for Hockey Club and Mammoth previously, along with the 18 other names from the final 20, Maughan said that was not a surprise and that plans are in place to resolve any issues with the names under consideration.
“This is a very standard part of any process naming, “Maughan said. “Now, obviously, we’re trying to do things in a much more condensed fashion than has largely ever been done before in professional sports, so we’re expediting that entire process. But nothing is unexpected. … We’ve known about all of those for months and have strategies to deal with anything that would be coming out from the trademark office regarding any of the names previously on the list or that remain on the list today.”
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