Go Jets Go

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Lore & Background

The original Winnipeg Jets were one of the founding franchises in the World Hockey Association (WHA), granted on November 12, 1971. They did not join the NHL until the 1979–80 season after the WHA–NHL merger, along with the Quebec Nordiques, Edmonton Oilers, and Hartford Whalers. The early years were defined by scrappy, hard-nosed hockey at the Winnipeg Arena, a modest concrete bowl that became a second living room for the city. Fans packed in shoulder to shoulder, and the simple call of "Go Jets Go" became the sonic signature of every home game, a refrain that required no melody, no production—just a crowd in unison. In 1996, team owner Barry Shenkarow sold the team to American businessmen Steven Gluckstern and Richard Burke. Burke and Gluckstern originally planned to move the team to Minnesota, but eventually reached an agreement with Phoenix businessman Jerry Colangelo that would see the team move to Arizona and become the Phoenix Coyotes. The original Winnipeg Jets played their last game on April 28, 1996. The city's grief was immediate and raw. Yet the chant did not die. It persisted in pub sing-alongs, in the memories of a generation, and in the quiet, stubborn hope that the Jets would come home. On May 31, 2011, at a press conference at the MTS Centre, NHL commissioner Gary Bettman confirmed that the Atlanta Thrashers had been sold to True North Sports & Entertainment and would relocate to Winnipeg for the 2011–12 season. The team was renamed the Jets after Winnipeg's original WHA/NHL team. When the new Jets took the ice at the MTS Centre, the first "Go Jets Go" from the stands carried the weight of fifteen years of waiting. The chant, in that moment, was no longer just a song. It was a homecoming.

In Their Own Story

The MTS Centre settles into its pre-game hum. Forty thousand voices murmur in the concrete bowl, a low tide of anticipation. The ice is freshly resurfaced, gleaming under the floodlights, and the smell of cold air and popcorn hangs in the upper deck. A kid in a faded original-era blue jersey—too big for him, clearly inherited—climbs onto the railing with his father's help. His father is quiet, arms crossed, watching the warm-up skaters carve their circles. The puck hits the boards with a flat, resonant crack. Then the organ swells, the lights dim, and the first wave of the crowd rises. "GO—JETS—GO!" The kid bellows it, off-key, all lungs. His father doesn't smile, but his jaw tightens, and his hand finds the kid's shoulder. Around them, the chant rolls in waves, a living thing with no conductor, and for one long, breathless moment the arena is not a building in Manitoba. It is every arena, every winter, every night a city chose to show up. The puck drops. The kid is screaming. His father is, too.

Reader's Guide

The "Go Jets Go" chant is the single most recognizable ritual in Winnipeg hockey culture. It is not performed; it is simply *done*, the way a city breathes. There is no fixed arrangement, no conductor, no required tempo. It erupts on goals, on saves, on the faceoff drop, and—most importantly—on the team introduction, when the home crowd rises as one and the sound hits the rafters and bounces back down like a physical force. For supporters, the chant is a covenant. It says: *we are here, we are not going anywhere, and we will cheer you as loudly as we can for as long as you wear these colors.* In a city that endured the loss of its original franchise in 1996 and waited over a decade for a new team, that covenant carries a weight that fans in larger-market cities rarely feel. The chant is the audible proof that the promise was kept. You do not need to know the rules of hockey to join in. You do not need to have been born in Winnipeg. You need only be in the arena when the moment comes, feel the floor vibrate under your skates or your boots, and open your mouth. The crowd will carry you. That is the whole secret: it is not a performance. It is a participation. And in Winnipeg, participation is identity.

Did You Know?

• The original Winnipeg Jets were one of the founding franchises in the World Hockey Association (WHA), granted on November 12, 1971, and did not join the NHL until the 1979–80 season after the WHA–NHL merger.
• The original Jets played their last game on April 28, 1996, before relocating to become the Phoenix Coyotes.
• The new Winnipeg Jets franchise was established when True North Sports & Entertainment bought the Atlanta Thrashers in May 2011 and relocated the team to Winnipeg for the 2011–12 season.
• Season tickets for the new Jets went on sale to the general public on June 4, 2011, and sold out in 17 minutes.
• The team's name was kept secret until the 2011 NHL entry draft on June 24, when general manager Kevin Cheveldayoff was introduced to make the team's first pick 'on behalf of the Winnipeg Jets.'