CFL appears to be planting expansion flag in Quebec City

Earlier this week, a Quebec City Radio host went to air with a scoop.

According to veteran sports journalist Sylvain Bouchard of FM93, the Canadian Football League has been in serious talks with business and political leaders in Quebec City for more than a year about an expansion franchise and new stadium to be built on the site where the Colisee, former home of the NHL’s Nordiques, still stands.

That story got a lot of traction in CFL circles because it seemed to come out of the blue.

So here’s what we do know about expansion under CFL commissioner Stewart Johnston, who has been on the job for 14 months.

At his introductory address last April, Johnston said that expansion was not at the top of his agenda. But with the announcements of changes to the rules, field dimensions and playoff format, plus the completion of new media deals, his early to-do list is largely behind him. So, it makes sense that he would embrace expansion, which represents many of the qualities he’s embraced in his leadership — change, growth and momentum.

He also said early in his term that when the time did come to add to the league’s existing nine teams, his focus would be squarely on Canada as opposed to the U.S.

That really leaves only two possibilities – Atlantic Canada and Quebec City. And given that the league has been there, done that when it comes to trying to stir up interest for a team on the East Coast, Quebec City is a logical choice.

Johnston watched the CFL’s very public courting of Atlantic Canada and the expectations that came with that, so it makes sense that he might go about it in a very different way.

Quebec City is a about the same size as Winnipeg. And given the growth of football in the province of Quebec, it’s surprising that the CFL hasn’t had greater interest before now.

One school of thought is that Quebec City’s football soul belongs to the local U Sports team, the Laval University Rouge et Or, perennial winners with a roster stocked entirely of French Canadians.

The CFL shouldn’t even think about Quebec City, some say.

It would be understandable, however, that some might see that a completely different way – that the success of the Rouge et Or, combined with the growth of grassroots football in Quebec, are solid reasons why the CFL should be trying to establish a franchise there as soon as possible.

Factor in the natural rivalry with the Montreal Alouettes and the potential to substantially boost the value of the French-language RDS contract, and it starts to make a lot of sense.

First let’s address the presence of the Rouge et Or.

In March, Jacques Tanguay, the financier backer of the Rouge et Or, was quoted in the Quebec press as being supportive of a CFL team in the city – provided it came with new infrastructure.

So, the Rouge et Or are presumably on board.

Is there room for both teams? This season the Laval plays four regular-season games between Sept. 5 and Oct. 18, with anticipated playoff dates after that. For a city of more than 800,000, that shouldn’t be a complete drain on the market’s appetite for football.

Laval typically draws 10,000 to 15,000 to Stade Telus-University Laval, a facility that might be able to house a CFL team temporarily. But a permanent home would have to be in the 25,000-seat range with amenities befitting a modern professional sports team, which is why the vision for Quebec City has to involve a new stadium.

Of course, the league that Quebec City has been trying to woo the past 15 years is not the CFL but the National Hockey League. It became aggressive on that front around the same time Winnipeg got its franchise back, building a new arena to NHL capacity in 2015, one that remains ready and waiting for commissioner Gary Bettman to say the word.

The fact is Quebec City is not on the NHL’s radar, just as Winnipeg would never have been had the league not had a crisis to solve in Atlanta, with an owner walking away and not a single buyer in the market.

That was a Halley’s Comet kind of moment in the business of the NHL and it’s not likely to come around again. That means that alongside the Rouge et Or and the local QMJHL franchise, a CFL team would be the big dog in town.

So, what’s the timeline for all this?

Well, if there’s one thing we’ve learned about Johnston it’s that he likes to work fast. His first year on the job has been characterized by a series of aggressive initiatives that including new rules and plans for new field dimensions and a new playoff format, not to mention a new broadcast partner added to the mix starting in 2027. All in just a little more than a year on the job.

So it shouldn’t surprise anyone if talks between the CFL and Quebec City civic and business leaders began not long after he took the job.

The CFL has been craving a tenth team in earnest since the early 1980s when the CFL first awarded a conditional franchise to a group proposing the Atlantic Schooners. But those Schooners, like the proposed Schooners team of 35 years later, never set sail

And now it appears the CFL is aggressively trying to plant its expansion flag somewhere else.

Click here to read article