Lacrosse League Awards Long Island Team to Gary Fuhrman Group

(Bloomberg) -- The National Lacrosse League awarded a Long Island expansion franchise to an ownership group led by private equity investor Gary Fuhrman and backers including Hank Ratner, the former chief executive officer of Madison Square Garden Co.

The team will play at the Nassau Coliseum starting next year and is asking fans to suggest names, the league said. The NLL is scheduled to formally announce the franchise and ownership group later Tuesday.

“New York not only aligns perfectly with our strategic plan to grow in the U.S., but also brings professional lacrosse back to a region that so many fans had wished for,” said NLL Commissioner Nick Sakiewicz.

Fuhrman, who runs GF Capital Management & Advisors, is building a sports-related investment fund called GF Sports. It has interests in global equestrian events and professional tennis tournaments, including the Atlanta Open and New York Open, formerly the Memphis Open, which is played at the recently renovated arena about 32 miles east of Manhattan.

The Nassau Coliseum, which serves as the part-time home to hockey’s New York Islanders, is owned by billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov’s BSE Global, which also owns Brooklyn’s Barclays Center.

Bloomberg News reported in September that the NLL would expand to the suburban New York lacrosse hotbed.

Expansion Plans

Planting a flag on Long Island is part of an expansion plan for an indoor league that has existed in its current incarnation since 1997. The addition of the Long Island franchise brings to 13 the number of teams in the league, which has added four clubs since August 2017.

The regular season will begin Dec. 15, about two weeks later than originally scheduled, due to collective bargaining talks between the league and players.

Long Island is the latest addition for the NLL. In September, the league awarded a franchise to Halifax, Nova Scotia, allowing the Rochester, New York, team to move there. As part of that deal, the league added a new team to Rochester that’ll be controlled by Buffalo Bills and Sabres owner Terry Pegula.

Joe Tsai, vice chairman of Alibaba Group Holdings Ltd., bought the NLL’s expansion team in San Diego, bringing another billionaire owner to a growing league seeking to expand its digital footprint. The league’s owners also include Kroenke Sports & Entertainment, which controls the Denver Nuggets, Colorado Avalanche, Los Angeles Rams and Arsenal of the English Premier League.

Ratner stepped down from Madison Square Garden in 2014 after overseeing the $1 billion renovation of the company’s namesake arena in midtown Manhattan. He is also an investor in WinView, a mobile application that allows fans to win cash by predicting in-game outcomes during sporting events

The NLL operates its own online video service and announced a deal in March to show matches on AT&T Inc.’s B/R Live sports streaming app.

To contact the reporter on this story: Scott Soshnick in New York at ssoshnick@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Nick Turner at nturner7@bloomberg.net, Rob Golum

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