Arizona looks to join Tucson in the hockey post-season come 2024
TUCSON — The Tucson Roadrunners roared back into the post-season in 2023. The Arizona Coyotes hope to do the same in 2024.
It’s been 12 years since Arizona’s NHL team competed for the Stanley Cup in a non-COVID 19 season.
The 2019-20 Yotes made the playoffs in the Canadian bubble, winning a qualifying round series against Nashville (3-1) before falling the Colorado Avalanche in a five-game 1st round series.
Other than that you have to go back to the Coyotes trip to the Western Conference Finals in 2012 to find the last playoff appearance for the club.
Arizona in fact does not have a 40-win season since that 2012 campaign that saw the Coyotes lose to the eventual Stanley Cup Champion Los Angeles Kings in five games.
The American Hockey League’s Roadrunners on the other hand have made the Calder Cup Playoffs four times in their seven seasons since moving to the Old Pueblo.
Tucson won the AHL’s Pacific Division in 2018 and 2020, advancing to the 2nd round in 2018. The 2020 campaign was shuttered due to the Coronavirus Pandemic.
The Roadrunners returned to the postseason in 2023 despite a losing record (30-33-8-1) overall on the season.
Arizona features a number of players who starred in Tucson including last season’s AHL scoring leader Mike Carcone (2021-2023), Lawson Crouse (2017-2018), J.J. Moser (2021), Barrett Hayton (2021) and Matias Maccelli (2021-2022).
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