This afternoon, Chief Operating Officer of the Buffalo Bills and Buffalo Sabres, Pete Guelli, announced that the Pegula family will be relinquishing operations of the Rochester Knighthawks come June 30th.

The Rochester native’s statement comes 5 weeks before the National Lacrosse League’s free agency period opens on August 1, and while there is still that amount of time to find a new ownership group, no matter where the franchise may play in 2025-26, the clock is ticking exponentially more quickly by the day. One may recall that it was July 29th when the league announced that they would be delaying the start of the offseason due to everything that led to the folding of Panther City Lacrosse Club last season. And while Brett Frood’s statement alludes to potential new ownership groups in the mix to ensure the Knighthawks do stay in Rochester long-term, again, the clock is ticking.

The timeline may suggest that the writing on the wall began appearing back at the beginning of April 2024, as that is when Terry Pegula announced that the Rochester teams, which operate as Rochester Hockey, LLC and Rochester Lacrosse, LLC after the Pegula Sports and Entertainment umbrella of all of his entities dissolved the year prior, would opt out of the 15 year operations agreement that they had signed back in October of 2019, the same month that the expansion Rochester Knighthawks would begin training camp. For further context, the Sabres operate as Buffalo Hockey, LLC, and the Bandits as Buffalo Lacrosse, LLC.

The venue management company, VenuWorks, was chosen by the City of Rochester to be the Arena’s next operators, and that partnership began on May 1, amidst the Rochester Americans playoff run. Part of today’s back-to-back announcements included a press release from the Amerks stating that their lease in the Blue Cross Arena was signed for another 5 years, starting with the 2025-26 season. The arena is now the largest building being operated by the Iowa-based firm.

While speculation of a potential sale and even relocation of the Knighthawks began to circulate in the spring and summer of 2024, the team itself released a statement to Gene Battaglia of The Fan Rochester in April 2024 denying the speculation and confirming that season ticket sales for the 2024-25 season would be underway, all while the roster on the floor won their final two games of that weekend to clinch a second consecutive playoff berth. There were no similar statements made when some relocation rumors were running through lacrosse media members during this season, and the organization has yet to announce its season tickets for 2025-26 being on sale, despite them doing so for the Amerks before their regular season came to a close.

The 2025 Knighthawks finished their season 10-8 and entered the playoffs as one of the hottest teams in the league, but had their season come to an end with a loss to the Vancouver Warriors, who were the only team hotter. The Warriors would of course lose to the Buffalo Bandits in the semifinals. Connor Fields was awarded the NLL’s Most Valuable Player with a 48 goal, 80 assist, 154 loose ball campaign.

So Now What?

It’s really a wait and see game from here. Even during rumors that surrounded Panther City’s eventual folding, there are ownership groups across North America that have interest in joining the National Lacrosse League, whether that is in Rochester or not. With 31 years of history between the City of Rochester and the National Lacrosse League, there is enough generational tradition to continue to nurture a fanbase and carry it into the next generation, whether its those who were around for the 5 championships won by the previous iteration or those who have gotten on board in the last few seasons as the team overcame their expansion woes pre-covid to becoming one of only four NLL franchises to make the playoffs in each of the last three seasons. Despite the small staff, most of whom had split duties with their work with the Amerks, including the sales and marketing staffs, the in-market players made their way around the city this season with numerous in-school appearances to draw excitement at the youth level, and, combined with the Finger Lakes Region, the area remains a hotbed for competitive lacrosse at the youth level.

There’s no reason not to believe that the league staff, led by Brett Frood, is committed to keeping this 31 year tradition going as well. Frood has retold on multiple interviews how his familiarity with the league dates back to attending games at the Blue Cross Arena in the late-1990s and early-2000s. If the speculation was true that there were sale conversations dating back multiple years between the Pegulas and other potential interested owners, which was expressed by Tim Graham last year as well, it’s just a matter of finding the right one to provide the stability that was initially expected when Terry and Kim purchased the expansion team in 2018 before Curt Styres initially moved the original franchise to Halifax, where that city has become one of the league’s top markets.

The 2025 Knighthawks averaged 5,456 fans per home game, ranking 8th in the league out of the 14 teams. After league-wide attendance surpassed 1,000,000 in 2023 and 2024, there was a drop off to 987,000 leaguewide, primarily attributed to Panther City folding and the Toronto Rock playing a temporary season in a much smaller arena in Mississauga while their regular home in Hamilton underwent anticipated massive renovations. But attendance in Rochester remained steady, with their home slate highlighted by their 90s night, featuring the black and teal jerseys of the era when the previous franchise was owned by Steve Donner.

In the meantime, the league and the NLLPA are active in collective bargaining talks, as the league’s CBA expires in October. With both sides of the negotiating table having implied at different points during the season that it may be a difficult negotiation period, having at least one team looking for a new owner a summer after a team folded is only going to make things more complicated, not to mention the instability of the continental economy, and the story is still being written. Certainly, more is to follow.