2016 Heritage Classic
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| Date | October 23, 2016 | |||||||||||||||
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| Arena | Investors Group Field | |||||||||||||||
| City | Winnipeg, Manitoba | |||||||||||||||
| Attendance | 33,240 | |||||||||||||||
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The 2016 Heritage Classic (known as the 2016 Tim Hortons NHL Heritage Classic for sponsorship reasons) was a regular season outdoor National Hockey League (NHL) game that was held on October 23, 2016. The game featured the Winnipeg Jets hosting the Edmonton Oilers at Investors Group Field in Winnipeg, home of the CFL's Blue Bombers. The Oilers defeated the Jets, 3-0. This was the fourth NHL Heritage Classic game, and the first of four outdoor regular season games during the 2016-17 NHL season. Unusual for the NHL outdoor games, the 2016 Heritage Classic was held in mid-autumn, during the first month of the regular season, to avoid Winnipeg's harsher winter temperatures.
The Jets originally announced in 2013 that they had reached an agreement with the NHL to host the game, to celebrate five years since the Atlanta Thrashers moved to Winnipeg, returning the NHL to Manitoba after a fifteen-year absence. The team had originally wanted to host the game in 2015–16, its actual fifth season. However, a disagreement occurred between the NHL and the Winnipeg Blue Bombers over the game's exact date: the league wanted it held in December 2015 while the football team became concerned that this date was too close to the 103rd Grey Cup being held at the stadium on November 29. In January 2015, the Jets announced that they could not reach an agreement to finalize a date for the Heritage Classic during the 2015-16 season. On March 6, 2016, the NHL officially announced that the Jets would host the Oilers in the 2016 Heritage Classic during the 2016–17 NHL season; the Blue Bombers would be on a bye week that week and would play their second last home game before the Heritage Classic on October 8. This gave the NHL nearly two weeks to prepare the stadium for the game.
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