For those who haven't seen it before, basically I have taken the schedule for every team in the WHL and figured out the distance, arena-to-arena, between each of their games. I've tried to take into consideration situations where a team would come home when they have a few days between road games, so that mileage is added in there as well. Add it all up, put it in this nice little chart, convert distances to both metric and Imperial measurement for the benefit of fans on both sides of the border, and you have an idea of how many miles (kilometers, eh?) each team in the WHL will put on their bus this upcoming season.
For the third year in a row, the WHL's travel champions are......the Prince George Cougars. And also for the third year in a row, Brandon comes second:
| Rank | Team | km | miles | change (km) | 2011-12 | 2010-11 |
| 1 | Prince George | 31450 | 19546 | 1931 | 29519 / 18342 (1) | 29816 / 18531 (1) |
| 2 | Brandon | 29834 | 18542 | 607 | 29227 / 18161 (2) | 28548 / 17743 (2) |
| 3 | Edmonton | 28235 | 17548 | 2355 | 25880 / 16081 (6) | 26931 / 16738 (4) |
| 4 | Kootenay | 28011 | 17409 | -235 | 28246 / 17551 (3) | 28124 / 17479 (3) |
| 5 | Prince Albert | 26946 | 16747 | 1662 | 25284 / 15711 (7) | 26785 / 16647 (6) |
| 6 | Spokane | 25829 | 16053 | 1806 | 24023 / 14927 (10) | 26856 / 16691 (5) |
| 7 | Medicine Hat | 25709 | 15978 | 1614 | 24095 / 14972 (9) | 24825 / 15429 (12) |
| 8 | Tri-City | 24634 | 15310 | -2269 | 26903 / 16717 (4) | 25602 / 15912 (8) |
| 9 | Portland | 24550 | 15258 | 1804 | 22746 / 14134 (12) | 25451 / 15818 (9) |
| 10 | Swift Current | 24367 | 15144 | 1617 | 22750 / 14136 (11) | 25757 / 16008 (7) |
| 11 | Saskatoon | 24175 | 15025 | 2610 | 21565 / 13400 (18) | 24441 / 15190 (14) |
| 12 | Red Deer | 23816 | 14802 | -495 | 24311 / 15106 (8) | 24465 / 15205 (13) |
| 13 | Kamloops | 23607 | 14672 | -2292 | 25899 / 16093 (5) | 25393 / 15782 (10) |
| 14 | Lethbridge | 23234 | 14440 | 536 | 22698 / 14104 (13) | 24957 / 15511 (11) |
| 15 | Regina | 22833 | 14191 | 952 | 21881 / 13596 (17) | 24111 / 14985 (15) |
| 16 | Kelowna | 22703 | 14110 | 634 | 22069 / 13713 (15) | 22346 / 13888 (20) |
| 17 | Victoria | 22410 | 13928 | 499 | 21911 / 13615 (16) | 19231 / 11952 (22) |
| 18 | Everett | 22283 | 13849 | 3000 | 19283 / 11982 (22) | 22447 / 13951 (18) |
| 19 | Vancouver | 21778 | 13535 | -497 | 22275 / 13841 (14) | 23096 / 14354 (16) |
| 20 | Seattle | 21693 | 13482 | 1436 | 20257 / 12587 (21) | 21913 / 13619 (21) |
| 21 | Calgary | 21358 | 13274 | 185 | 21173 / 13156 (20) | 22941 / 14258 (17) |
| 22 | Moose Jaw | 21108 | 13119 | -90 | 21198 / 13172 (19) | 22425 / 13937 (19) |
As you can see, for the most part there isn't a lot of movement year-over-year; simple geography dictates that isolated teams like Prince George and Brandon are going to have to travel a lot more distance than teams that are fairly close to one or two frequent opponents - the proximity of Seattle/Everett and Moose Jaw/Regina to one another helps keep those teams near the bottom of this chart every year, for example.
One thing that does stand out is the giant swings in distance traveled - many teams have increases or decreases from last year of over 2000+ km. But then, if you compare their distance this year to that of two years ago, in many cases it looks more similar. So at least a good chunk of these swings in distance can probably be explained by the WHL's alternating schedule for when the Central & Eastern divisions visit the U.S. division, and vice versa. Edmonton's distance is up 2300 km from last year, for example, but then last year they didn't make a trip to the U.S. teams - which are the furthest teams in the league from them - and this year they do.
Does all this mean anything, other than just being a "fun fact" kinda thing? Well, who knows. Common sense would tell us that a team that travels more will be more fatigued and might see a downturn in their play. Prince George travels the most, for example, and they have struggled on the ice far more years than they have been successful. But on the other hand, Brandon travels almost as much and they are perpetually one of the more competitive teams in the league. So I'm gonna state the obvious and say that while travel might be a factor, the strength of your roster is still far, far more important.
Anyway, enjoy....
