Acadie-Bathurst’s loss is St. John’s’ gain, as the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League today confirmed widespread speculation that the Titan are relocating to the capital city for the 2025-26 season.

Team shareholder, Marc Guignard told reporters this morning that while he’s disappointed the team is moving, he offered a word of warning to all hockey fans out there who are interested in keeping their teams at home: support them.

He says they needed a base of about 2,000 fans a game in order to break even, and even when the team was at the top of the standings, they still only attracted about 1,500 fans.

An official news conference is scheduled for St. John’s in January.

Glenn Stanford, who, along with Executive Director of St. John’s Sports and Entertainment Brent Meade spoke with reporters this afternoon, says he feels for the Acadie-Bathurst fans, but it’s good news for St. John’s and the Mary Brown’s Centre.

“We’re both pretty happy about it,” Stanford said of him and Meade. “Brent has done a wonderful job since he’s come on board in trying to get more events in the building.” In saying the the building doesn’t work without major tenants, he acknowledged that the demise of the Growlers “was not the way we wanted to finish here…we’ve worked hard over the last six months to make this happen.”

The transfer marks the return of major junior hockey to the province for the first time since the Fog Devils left.