Hamilton Bulldogs

The lower bowl in Hamilton is quite big and seats somewhere around 9,000 people when full. However, I’ve always found the seating in this bowl to be a tad too shallow, and in turn feeling like I’m a bit too far from the ice surface. Not to a terrible degree, and the views are generally ok but could be better. During the Bulldogs days in Hamilton, whether it was the AHL or OHL, the crowds were usually at best ok to slightly respectable. A crowd of 4,000-5,000 people for an OHL regular season game is quite good but inside Copps Coliseum it feels like the place is empty and has a lack of big game atmosphere. To try and help with this some of the seating high up in corners were tarped off and some of the retractable seating was pulled back to install things like a party deck or a kid’s zone. Back during the AHL days the ceiling was dotted with banners from Hamilton’s lengthy hockey history. This included banners for the AHL’s Calder Cup team of 2007, the various cities OHL teams that captured league titles and Memorial Cups through the decades and even acknowledgement of the city’s NHL team (The Tigers) from a century ago. When the Bulldogs became an OHL team in 2015 most of those banners were stored away. One hopes that when the rink reopens that those banners someday return.

The people of Hamilton will every once in a while, fill the building for hockey. The famous 1987 Canada Cup final which many regard as the greatest hockey game ever played took place here to a rocking sold out crowd. The largest single game attendance in Memorial Cup history gathered in Hamilton to watch the 1990 double OT final classic between Oshawa and Kitchener. The 2007 Calder Cup was won on Copps ice to a sold out crowd, and most recently a crowd of over 11,000 watched the Bulldogs capture the 2022 OHL Championship in a game 7 victory over the Windsor Spitfires.

One hopes that if/when hockey returns to the Hammer that people will support it well enough that the city stops becoming a revolving door for teams. They had a good thing going with nearly 30 years of the Bulldogs before that abruptly came to an end. Hopefully a new tradition starts soon.