The Dallas Stars are heading to Denver to continue on their series against the Colorado Avalanche. Did you know they almost were not called that back in the day?

The series is currently tied in the first round between the Dallas Stars and Colorado Avalanche with a big overtime win last night. These two teams have now met seven times in the playoffs including a Western Conference finals match up back in the day when the Stars would be on their way to their first ever Stanley Cup championship. If you want some fun hockey history, The Denver Post forever changed the Avalanche.

Back in the summer of 1995, it was announced that the Quebec Nordiques would be moving to Denver, Colorado. The owner of the team was a company called COMSAT, which stood for Communications Satellite Corporation. COMSAT did not want to use Colorado or even Denver for their team name. They wanted to be known as the Rocky Mountain Extreme.

A beat reporter with The Denver Post named Adrian Dater got word that his city's new NHL franchise was going to be called The Extreme. So he ran a story in the paper about it and the city went nuts. People were calling and complaining to sports radio stations about the supposed team name saying how stupid it was. Allegedly the logos above were going to be what the team would use.

If you wanted to have a team name straight out of the 1990's, it's tough to beat Extreme! The owners of the new Colorado team hated the bad press they were getting before the team even dropped their first puck that they went back to the drawing board.

Colorado Avalanche are Born

On August 10, 1995 it was official, the new NHL team was going to be called The Colorado Avalanche. The rest is history and Dater has been credited with forever changing the history of the franchise. Some have rumored that the team intentionally leaked the name to gauge public feedback. Either way, the Extreme are dead and the Avalanche live on.