By ANDY KENT
Naples Daily News

ESTERO — History has been made within the Florida
Everblades organization this week as the ECHL club saw
one of its own make the jump directly to the National
Hockey League.

Sammy Wallace, ticket manager for the Everblades and
Germain Arena, was hired to do the same job for the
Florida Panthers and the Office Depot Center across
Alligator Alley in Sunrise. His last day at Germain is
Friday and he will start his new job Monday.

"The way I worded it to our employees here is he had a
chance to move to the majors and we'll never stop
someone from moving up," said Everblades team
president and general manager Craig Brush, who also is
the arena president. "He's a seasoned guy who's done a
great job for us and knows what he's doing. He'll be
fine."

Brush filled the two positions Wallace was responsible
for with in-house promotions Wednesday, naming group
sales manager Nathan Gosline director of sales and
promoting Sandy Moskal from box office supervisor to
box office manager.

Gosline will oversee season ticket sales, corporate
sales and group sales and Moskal, entering her eighth
season, will be in charge of all aspects involving the
Germain Arena box office.

Wallace, 34, has been in his current position for two
full seasons with the Everblades and was in the
Orlando market with two different teams in two
different leagues before that — the Solar Bears of the
now-defunct International Hockey League and the Seals
of the now-defunct Atlantic Coast Hockey League.

Although a chance to move up to the top professional
hockey league in the world might seem like a
no-brainer to most, Wallace actually had to take some
time to think about it before accepting the Panthers
job. That's how much he cherished his time in Estero.

"They offered the job and it was a difficult decision
for me to make quite honestly, even though it is the
NHL, because I do like this market," Wallace said
Monday as he tried to tie up some loose ends in the
Germain ticket office. "But I just felt it was an
opportunity I couldn't pass up at this point in my
career.

And I can't complain about the pay."

Chad Johnson, the Panthers' senior vice president of
sales and marketing, had heard of Wallace before
around the close-knit hockey community but was
introduced to him by another event coordinator. The
job he wound up hiring Wallace for first became
available two months ago.

Johnson and the Panthers were looking for somebody who
had experience dealing with ticket sales for sporting
events and concerts and other types of entertainment.
He found that in Wallace, with the hockey background
being another added bonus.

"I spent about five years with the Lightning and we
thought highly of the Blades' organiz ation," Johnson
said by phone from his Sunrise office. "We were down
there quite a bit for exhibition games and other
events. Sammy's hiring couldn't come at a better time.


(Tuesday) was our biggest day for season ticket sales
in the last five years (200 new packages sold)."

The new salary structure in the NHL stands to benefit
teams like the Panthers, who constantly lost out on
big-name free agents under the previous collective
bargaining agreement.

Monday's signings of veteran forwards Joe Nieuwendyk,
a four-time All-Star, and Gary Roberts had an
immediate impact on ticket sales.

Even though he now has 13,000 more seats to try to
fill, Wallace is excited about the challenge that lies
ahead, and feels confident he will be able to deliver
in a South Florida market that has been tough to
please.

"Obviously, I would have loved to have won that
lottery and gotten Sidney Crosby (the top draft pick
who went to Pittsburgh)," Wallace said. "But they did
sign two quality veterans in Roberts and Nieuwendyk,
two veterans they couldn't have gotten before. ...

It's a great building and a phenomenal market and I
think they're really one of the prototype markets for
this new salary structure."

In other front-office moves, Joshua Schwinghammer was
promoted from advertising and promotions coordinator
to director of marketing and Ethan May was hired as a
new account executive after serving in the same
capacity for the Reading Royals the last two years.

August 4, 2005

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