Junior league hockey team moving to Mediacom Ice Park

A Western States Hockey League junior team is relocating to Springfield and will start play this fall at Mediacom Ice Park.

The team will be known as the Springfield Express, part of the conference in the Amateur Athletic Union Tier III Junior Hockey League covering states west of the Mississippi River. The team is relocating from Rio Rancho, N.M., where it goes by the name New Mexico Renegades, according to a news release.

The league serves as a preparatory experience for players ages 16-20 who want to play on the collegiate and professional levels.

“The Springfield Express brings a powerful, hard-hitting level of hockey to our area,” said Jeff Cumley, manager of Jordan Valley Park, where Mediacom Ice Park is located, in the release. “It’ll be great for hockey fans and it’ll be especially great to have these guys around as role models for our youth hockey players.”

Springfield Express co-owner Joe MacConnell added Springfield native Phillip Solari to the team on Thursday. Solari, 18, who started playing hockey in Springfield at age 7, transfers from Maine, where he plays for the Portland Jr. Pirates in the Eastern Hockey League.

Springfield-Greene County Park Board Public Information Administrator Jenny Fillmer Edwards said the team would pay $180 per hour for practices and $210 per hour for games in its lease agreement with the parks system.

The Springfield Express represents the first junior league-affiliated hockey team to play at Mediacom Ice Park since the early 2000s, when the Springfield Spirit played locally, the release said.

The team will begin practicing in Springfield in August and the 2014-15 season runs September-March.