OHL’s Plymouth Whalers Officially Announce Relocation to Flint

The Ontario Hockey League's Plymouth Whalers are relocating to Flint and will call the Perani Arena their home for the 2015-2016 season.

The deal has been in the works for a minute now and was not really a secret, but now-former team owner Peter Karmanos announced that the Whalers had been sold in a press conference at 11a today. The deal is still pending OHL approval.

The new owners of the Perani Arena have already made good on their promise to bring a new hockey team to town just  a couple of weeks after taking over operations. The arena was formerly home to the Flint Generals and currently serves as home ice for the Michigan Warriors.

The Plymouth Whalers play a higher level of competitive hockey than either the current or previous tenants. The Generals, while a hell of a lot of fun to watch, were considered a low level professional hockey team. The Warriors are a junior team in a Tier II U.S. League. The Whalers are a major junior team (the highest level of junior hockey) and are in one of the three leagues that constitute the Canadian Hockey League. Players choosing to play junior hockey as instead of college hockey on their path to the NHL is a fairly common occurrence.

The Plymouth Whalers have played at the Compuware Arena in Plymouth, MI since 1997 and are set to begin their first season as the home team at the Perani Arena and Event Center this fall.