Confirmed: Leafs bring back Arenas jerseys against Carolina

Back at the beginning of August, our very own Ryan “You Fancey, Huh?” Fancey pondered the possibility of the Leafs throwing it even farther back for this year’s outdoor game, set to take place at the Navy-Marine Corps Memorial Stadium on March 3rd.

For now, we still don’t know what the team is going to don for that particular matchup.

When they face off against the Carolina Hurricanes on December 19th, though, they’re going to go with the jersey we’ve all been needing in our lives all along.

THAT’S RIGHT.

It was confirmed on Tuesday, via TSN’s Kristen Shilton, that the team will break out the Toronto Arenas jerseys for what’s being dubbed their ‘Next Century Game’ at 2pm.

Take. A. Look. At. These. Beauties.

The jerseys, per Shilton, will honor the first-ever game played for the franchise by the Toronto Arenas. It symbolizes just how far the team has come since they first took the ice in 1917, winning the Stanley Cup as the unnamed Toronto Hockey Club owned by the Toronto Arena Company in 1918 before being renamed the Arenas in the following year.

The Arenas went on to be re-branded as the Toronto St. Patrick’s in 1919, and the Leafs have already honored that particular incarnation with their Stadium Series jerseys from last season.

While it’s utterly hilarious that the Leafs are going to face off against the Hurricanes, of all teams, in their game honoring the next century of play, it’s still pretty excellent to see them using the Arenas sweaters in actual game play.

As Shilton points out, fans will be able to purchase the sweaters this December:

They aren’t quite as incredible as the Vancouver Millionaires jerseys, but they’re pretty darn close.

(Actually, why don’t we have the Arenas playing the Millionaires this year to commemorate the first-ever Stanley Cup Final? I need real answers here.)

Of course, now the question remains whether or not the team will use these jerseys again for the game against the Capitals in March. It seems hard to believe that the team would give up another opportunity to make money with a short-term jersey reveal in the spring, but it’s also hard to imagine the league letting Toronto ice four separate designs while the other teams don’t even have an alternate.