Evansville is currently home to two semi-professional and two professional squads, with a third coming in 2019.
But over the years, several other organizations have come and gone. In fact, since the 1980s, five professional teams have left. Here’s a look at what each of them accomplished (or in some cases, didn’t), in their time here and why they didn’t last.
Evansville IceMen (2008 – 2016)
Started in 2008 in the now-defunct All-American Hockey League, the IceMen won their only league championship in 2010, the same year the team disbanded. However, the team’s name lived on when owner Ron Geary bought and moved the Muskegon Lumberjacks to Indiana that same year.
For two seasons, the IceMen played in the Central Hockey League, later moving to the ECHL (formerly known as the East Coast Hockey League). This put the team in the pipeline to the NHL, starting with operating as a Columbus Blue Jackets affiliate in 2014. The team became an affiliate of the Ottawa Senators in 2016.
By 2016, the cost of operation was enough to push the team out of the city. The IceMen said they paid $650,000 per season to rent the Ford Center, more than four times the average cost for ECHL teams.
In response, the city offered to lower the team’s rent from about $11,000 per game to, at most, $1,000 per game in exchange for concession sales going to the city. It wasn’t good enough for Geary.
“If the city cannot come up with the money, then they are in effect forcing us out and we would have no other possibility other than to leave,” Geary said in 2016.
After exploring a possible move to neighboring Owensboro, the team moved to a whole other part of the country in 2017. Taking the team’s namesake with them, the relocated to Jacksonville, Florida in 2017.
Evansville Rage (2012)
The team was the final expansion team to join the now-defunct Continental Indoor Football League in 2012, playing home games at Swonder Ice Arena.
Following a 7-3 season, team owner and general manager Eddie Cronin died in a car crash. His fiance, Melissa Logsdon, assumed his ownership role and moved the team across the Ohio River to her hometown, Owensboro.
The team folded in 2013, forfeiting their final two games, due to lack of funding.
Evansville BlueCats (2003 – 2007)
Who could forget this logo? This team played home games at Roberts Stadium, the Ford Center’s predecessor. Known as “FinHeads,” the fans’ booster club was registered as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization.
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On the field, former high school stars from the area made their mark with the team, including Levron Williams from Bosse High School and Sean Bennett from Harrison High School.
But the team struggled to remain financially solvent as crowds lessened over the years. The BlueCats’ owners, the Voliva family, were unable to ever turn a profit on a team that never posted a winning record.
“The city of Evansville has made it quite clear that anyone else would be insane to come in here until the city changes its philosophy on supporting minor-league sports, or professional sports, period,” said coach John Hart in 2007 when the team ceased operations.
Evansville Thunder (1984-1986)
University of Evansville alumnus and Hall of Fame coach Jerry Sloan was hired to coach this team in its inaugural season, but resigned before attending a single practice, let alone game.
The team, which played at Roberts Stadium, was owned by David Ellenstein. The team came to rely on loans from the league to keep it afloat, but by 1986, the league had had enough. The CBA expelled Ellenstein’s team due to $70,000 in debts owed at the end of the season.
But the players wanted nothing to do with those details: they wanted to play. The Thunder’s regular season was good enough to get them a spot in the playoffs that year, so seven teammates sued the league in an effort to make a post-season run. An agreement was reached in which the league would pay players salaries while Ellenstein paid other team fees.
The set up didn’t last long. The Thunder franchise came to an end after losing in Game 5 of the Western Division Semifinals against the Cincinnati Slammers, 115-104.
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Evansville Triplets (1970 – 1984)
How did they settle on “Triplets?” The name was selected through a naming contest, apparently a riff on being a team in the Tri-State region, playing Triple-A baseball, and being an affiliate of the Minnesota Twins.
The team was birthed out of a necessity for more players after Major League Baseball expanded to four additional teams in 1969.
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But by the next season, the Triplets became affiliated with the Milwaukee Brewers, and by 1974, the Detroit Tigers. That relationship made Evansville a stop for greats like Darrell Porter and Kirk Gibson. And long before he joined the Tigers or even made it to Big Leagues, Jim Leyland managed the Triplets from 1979 to 1981. He led them to two of the franchise’s three championships in that time.
But in 1984, after working with city officials, securing funding and even mortgaging his own home, Larry Schmittou bought the Triplets and relocated them to Nashville. The team became known as the Nashville Sounds and still plays Triple-A baseball today.
Nate Chute is a producer with the USA Today Network. Follow him on Twitter at @nchute.
