International Hockey League (1996-1998)
Tombstone
Born: May 1, 1996 – The Atlanta Knights relocate to Quebec City
Folded: Postseason 1998
First Game: October 4, 1996 (L 3-2 @ Detroit Vipers)
Last Game: April 12, 1998 (W 5-3 @ Fort Wayne Komets)
Turner Cup Championships: None
Arena
Le Colisee de Quebec (15,399)11997-98 Quebec Rafales Yearbook
Opened: 1949
Closed: 2015
Marketing
Team Colors: White, Dark Blue, Yellow & Green21997-98 Quebec Rafales Yearbook
Ownership
Owners: David Berkman & Richard Adler
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Background
The Quebec Rafales were a short-lived entry in the International Hockey League, an aggressive, big budget minor league going through a growth spurt in the mid-1990’s. The Rafales headlined at Le Colisee de Quebec for two winters from 1996 to 1998. “Rafales” means cold gust in French. The team’s mascot, prominently featured on this inaugural season media guide, was a Yeti character snowboarding on a hockey stick.
The club began life as the Atlanta Knights (1992-1996) of the IHL under the ownership of David Berkman, a real estate baron and hockey fanatic from Atlanta. Berkman pulled the Knights out of Atlanta in May of 1996 due to a lease impasse and the impending demolition of the Omni arena. The 15,400-seat Colisee de Quebec was available thanks to the departure of the NHL’s Quebec Nordiques a year earlier for greener pastures in Denver, Colorado. So the Knights became the Rafales and attempted to fill the pro hockey void for broken hearted Nordiques fans.
NHL Aspirations & a Minor League Empire
Berkman’s long-held dream of owning an NHL franchise himself never came to fruition. He did make an unsuccessful offer on the Tampa Bay Lightning club in 1997 shortly after the Rafales completed their first IHL season in Quebec. Instead, Berkman owned several minor league hockey clubs and Arena Football teams during the 1990’s and early 2000’s with partners Richard Adler and Charles Felix. His two-year IHL adventure in Quebec City was the only time he operated a club outside his Southeastern U.S. base of operations.
As the Rafales’ first season dawned in October 1996, the club publicly flirted with NHL defenseman Chris Simon. The former Nordique was a holdout at the time from the defending Stanley Cup champion Colorado Avalanche. The rumored signing drew some light press attention across North America, but Simon never did join the Rafales. Instead, the team’s highest profile player was rugged defenseman Bob Sweeney, who spent the bulk of his decade-long NHL career with the Boston Bruins.
The End
During the Rafales’ debut season, the team claimed an average attendance of 11,575 fans per game, an astonishing number for a minor league team. But the figure was reportedly due to littering Quebec City with free tickets and the front office apparently sold only 800 season tickets for the Rafales’ second season.3Tait, Ed. “Moose not a fashionable product … yet.” The Sun (Winnipeg, MB). November 9, 1997
Late in the Rafales’ sophomore season, in March of 1998, the club began aggressively shedding payroll in a series of trades with their IHL rivals. Berkman and Adler had had enough of the IHL and Quebec City. A local investor group led by Michel Page attempted to purchase and save the club, but the deal fell through in early August 1998 and the Rafales folded after just two seasons.
The American Hockey League arrived in 1999 and put the Montreal Canadiens’ top farm club in Le Colisee. The Quebec Citadelles lasted three seasons before moving away to Hamilton, Ontario in 2002.
The International Hockey League went out of business in 2001. Le Colisee de Quebec closed in 2015, replaced by the gargantuan $370 million Videotron Centre. Despite seating 18,500 fans for hockey, the Videotron Centre has never hosted the sport above the junior (amateur) level.
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