Johnstown Jets

The Johnstown Jets were a professional ice hockey team from Johnstown, Pennsylvania. The Jets were founded in the Eastern Amateur Hockey League for the 1950–51 season, playing at the newly constructed Cambria County War Memorial Arena. The Jets won consecutive EHL championships in 1951–52 and 1952–53.

When the EAHL suspended operations in 1953, the Jets transferred to the International Hockey League, where they played two seasons. Johnstown were Turner Cup finalists in 1953–54, losing 4 games to 2, to the Cincinnati Mohawks.

In 1955, the Jets joined the Eastern Hockey League (a league founded from the EAHL), and won three consecutive EHL championships in 1959–60, 1960–61 and 1961–62. Johnstown remained in the league until its demise in 1973.

The Jets then joined the new North American Hockey League in 1973. Dick Roberge coached Johnstown to the Lockhart Cup championship 1974–75, defeating the Broome Dusters. That season's playoff run included the Carlson brothers, Jeff, Jack and Steve, who became the basis for the Hanson Brothers in the movie Slap Shot. Jeff and Steve Carlson portrayed their fictional selves in the movie, while former Jet Dave Hanson portrayed Jack. The Jets played four seasons total in the NAHL before the league folded in 1977. The team itself folded in the offseason, when the Johnstown flood of 1977 that damaged the arena's ice making equipment.

Johnstown was later represented by the Johnstown Wings (later Red Wings) from 1978-80. The Red Wings folded after two seasons, but hockey returned to Johnstown in 1988 with the Johnstown Chiefs, which named itself after the Jets' fictional counterpart from Slap Shot.