The Denver Spurs were a rushed franchise, granted to Ivan Mullenix in May 1975, with plans to begin play less than five months later. Mullenix owned the Western League Denver Spurs and had once been courted by the NHL.
Mullenix had received a conditional expansion franchise for Denver in the NHL in 1974, for a planned expansion in 1976 that never came to fruition. In early 1975, the NHL dropped its plans to expands and revoked the Denver franchise, as well as one planned for Seattle.
The WHA, meanwhile, was dealing with two soon-to-be extinct teams in Chicago and Baltimore. A new team, Cincinnati, was coming on board in Fall 1975. To avoid an awkward 13-team league, the WHA offered Mullenix the rights to place a team in Denver. By doing so, the WHA solved one problem: most of the players from the failed Chicago roster were transferred over to the new Denver team, to be called the Spurs.
There was reason to be hopeful about the new Denver team. They would play at the new McNicholls Arena in a city developing quickly into a major sports town. Jean-Guy Talbot would coach, carrying over his role from the 1974-75 Western League edition of the Spurs. Ralph Backstrom was the most notable name on the roster, coming over from the Chicago team.
The Denver hockey fans never got the memo, though, and they stayed away in impressive numbers. After being teased with an NHL franchise for a year, then to have it revoked and replaced by a WHA version, fans felt no kinship for the WHA Spurs.
The Spurs themselves did little to attract the fans, setting a record by going winless in its first eight home games. Attendances ranged between 1,500 to 3,000 per game, far too small to support a team. The Arena itself was expensive to rent with no other revenue streams available to Mullenix. The Denver operation quickly fell into the red.
The Spurs limped along for three months. A "guaranteed win" game against Calgary on November 21, 1975, failed to yield results. The team lost, of course, but few fans redeemed their tickets for a later game. This was partly due to the fact that there were few fans at the game in the first place, and the fact that after December 30, 1975, the Spurs would leave town, never to return.
Mullenix had been in talks with a group from Ottawa called the Founders Club, a loose aggregate of businessmen and fans in the Canadian Capital seeking to return big-league hockey to Ottawa. The Founders Club would not own the team, but acted as an intermediary for a possible sale. In the meantime, the Founders Club would cover some costs to allow the team to use the Ottawa Civic Centre as its "home away from home" ice.
The Spurs were essentially on a two-week road trip, in which two of its home games took place in Ottawa, the team now rebranded as the Civics. The first game drew very well, over 9,000 in the arena, a sell-out, and something the Spurs never experienced in Denver nor the old Nationals experienced back in 1972-73. The second home game, and what would prove to be its last, a tilt against Houston, also drew a sell-out crowd.
Despite the strong fan support, Mullenix was desperate to sell and pay off his debts, with the City of Denver after him for many unpaid bills. He wanted out, the sooner the better. An offer made to Mullenix was rejected as being too low. He began to sell his players to other teams, with Backstrom leaving for New England. This effectively folded the team, and the Spurs/Civics were formally dissolved on January 17, 1976.
The WHA made no effort to prop up the team as it had in previous seasons with its failing clubs. This would be the point at which the WHA steadily shed teams, folding six over the next eighteen months and eventually dropping down to six teams — an 8-team decline — by late 1978. Six weeks later, the Minnesota Fighting Saints would also fold in mid-season.
Lost in the drama were the efforts of its players. Ralph Backstrom had 21 goals and 50 points to lead the team, and Don Borgeson also scored 21 goals. Gary MacGregor scored 16, while goaltender Bob Johnson won 8 games and Cam Newton recording the team's lone shutout. Anyone not previously sold was declared a free agent and allowed to find their own ways to other teams.
In Fall 1976, the NHL relocated its failed Kansas City team to Denver, also to play in the McNicholls Arena. The new "Colorado Rockies" were a dreadful squad that performed poorly and also struggled to draw fans; that team would last just six years before moving to New Jersey, where they remain today as the Devils.
In 1995, the "WHA" returned to Denver, as the old Quebec Nordiques transferred over and began a new life as the Colorado Avalanche. Unlike its forebears, the new Avs won over the fans quickly, winning the Stanley Cup in its first season (1996) and again in 2001 and one more, much later, in 2022. Finally, the WHA had roots in Denver.
(Source: Newspapers.com)
