Golden Knights owner Bill Foley had the vision in place two years ago.
He long wanted a gold jersey to complement the traditional steel grey home and white road sweaters that have been the top selling in the NHL two of the past three years.
Foley’s vision came to life Friday when the Golden Knights unveiled their long-awaited third jerseys, the first metallic-gold sweater in NHL history, created by adidas, which will be worn starting the 2020-21 season.
The sweaters aren’t completely encompassed in gold like Foley mentioned would be the case back in February, but that doesn’t mean these still don’t pop off first glance.
The base of the jersey is, in fact, metallic gold. The fabric doesn’t have the feel of a traditional hockey sweater; it feels like strands of gold were stitched on delicately.
On the back, the nameplate and numbers are black. The numbers are surrounded by a white trim. The alternate sword logos still sit on the shoulders.
Golden Knights chief marketing officer Brian Killingsworth said they went through multiple shades of gold through various forms of testing before coming to ease with the dubbed “metallic gold.”
For something that’s never been done such as a jersey like this, the Golden Knights had to make sure that these sweaters passed a feel test for the players, an eye test on the ice, and how they would appear on TV. For two years, Foley and the Golden Knights set out to do something different than what the NHL has seen, and what adidas has done.
“Adidas kind of knows what to expect from us now working with them,” Killingsworth said. “They’re great partners, but they know it’s going to be different. There was a lot of doubt from both sides. We asked for something that had never been done before.”
The sleeves carry components from the Golden Knights’ current rotation of sweaters in three sections. The top holds the steel grey with white numbers centered in place; below that is the road white, while the alternate red stripes below it. Gold finishes the sleeve from the elbow down. Numbers are on both sleeves with a white base and gold trim.
Killingsworth said the idea was to not only have a sweater that would look good on the ice, but that would pop in the stands of T-Mobile Arena, as well as be a fashion statement off the ice; whether it be walking around the Strip at night or a trip around Summerlin.
When the time comes to see these jerseys in the stands remains to be seen. The NHL just concluded its season this week and there’s no timeline for when next season will begin. When it does, T-Mobile Arena may open in limited capacity to approximately 1,750 fans after the state of Nevada loosened guidelines for venues with large seating capacity earlier this week.
“Since it was a two-year process, we were hoping to get it out last season, but we felt with coming up short this last season in the playoffs, we felt it was a good time to come back,” Killingsworth said. “We know our fans are still hungry for the Golden Knights and we thought by giving them a longer window going into the offseason and into the holiday season, to get this before we start back up again was the right strategy.”
Starting Friday, fans can purchase one of 777 “Treasure Chests” which consists of a jersey, customization and a limited-edition gold coin. With that Treasure Chest, 300 of them will also hold a pair of metallic gold adidas Ultraboost Shoes. The total, with the shoes, comes out to $777 and $499 without. The jerseys are now on sale at NHLshop.com with authentic jerseys starting as much as $224.99.
“When Mr. Foley and the Golden Knights leadership indicated the desire to ‘go gold’ it was on our team to turn this from an idea into reality,” said Dan Near, senior director of adidas Hockey. “When our prototype hit the brief, and had the attributes to pass the rigorous performance testing that any new fabric is subject to, the pride in the organization and the product creation team was pretty special knowing the unique effort involved in this unprecedented design.”
Killingsworth said that the jerseys will be put in regular rotation, but there’s no set plan on when or how they’ll be utilized. And, yes, the white gloves will be a regular with these jerseys, as well.