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Utah Hockey Club's nickname saga takes another turn
Rob Gray-Imagn Images

Utah Hockey Club's nickname saga takes another turn

The nickname saga for the Utah Hockey Club took another unexpected turn on Thursday when the team announced it is removing Wasatch from its list of finalists and replacing it with Outlaws.

The update comes just 24 hours after Wasatch was initially revealed as one of the three finalists. 

It was obviously not well received by the fan base. 

Utah, playing in its first year after relocating from Arizona where it was the Coyotes for more than two decades, is still trying to finalize an official nickname and has run into several issues along the way. Specifically copyright issues. 

The preferred name by fans and hockey media was to be the Utah Yeti, but the team and the NHL had the copyright refused by the United States Patent and Trademark Office due to potential confusion with the Yeti cooler company. 

Venom and Blizzard were also refused for similar copyright reasons. 

With Yeti off the table, Utah is now down to Mammoth, Outlaws and its current name, the Utah Hockey Club as potential options. 

Fan voting at upcoming home games will help determine the name. 

Seeing Wasatch on the finalist list on Wednesday was a surprise given that it was never really mentioned throughout the process when it all started. Wasatch refers to the mountain range that goes through Utah and Salt Lake City where the club plays. It is probably a bad sigh for a potential nickname when even local fans don't want it, and nobody outside of the city had any idea what it meant. 

Adam Gretz

Adam Gretz is a freelance writer based in Pittsburgh. He covers the NHL, NFL, MLB and NBA. Baseball is his favorite sport -- he is nearly halfway through his goal of seeing a game in every MLB ballpark. Catch him on Twitter @AGretz

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