ORLANDO, FLA - The Southern Professional Hockey League is about to officially grow by one more member.

A press conference has been announced for Thursday, May 7 at 3 P.M. CDT at the Mississippi Coast Coliseum to introduce the Biloxi, Mississippi franchise to the SPHL roster. It follows last week’s announcement by the league that it had received an application with a signed lease agreement from an ownership group wishing to place an SPHL team in Biloxi.

Biloxi had been the home of the Mississippi Sea Wolves of the ECHL. It was announced on March 30th that the Sea Wolves would be suspending operations due to financial issues with a formal notice of intentions due to the ECHL prior to the league meetings in June. The Sea Wolves had played in the ECHL for 10 of the past 12 years with suspended operations due to Hurricane Katrina damage to the MCC accounting for the two missed seasons.

Expected to be in attendance at the press conference are SPHL Commissioner Jim Combs, former Sea Wolves head coach Steffon Walby, representatives of the ownership group and members of the front office staff.

Biloxi is the second city to join the SPHL in a week’s time. Last Thursday, an ownership group led by former Ice Pilots owner and NHL star Tim Kerr was given a provisional go-ahead to put a team into Pensacola, Florida starting this fall. If Kerr’s group can sell 1,250 season tickets before August 15, the negotiated lease agreement will go into effect.

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