Ice hockey teams belonging to the American Hockey League have taken part at the Spengler Cup, an invitational annual international tournament held in Davos, Switzerland and televised across Europe, Canada and Asia. The Rochester Americans participated in the 1996 and 2013 editions of the tournament,[1][2] placing third and exiting in the quarterfinal, respectively. Future participation of AHL teams has been publicly discussed by the tournament organizers, addressed in online petitions started by US-based hockey fans and directed at the Spengler Cup organizing committee (these petitions were in turn covered by Swiss media[3]), and has been the subject of coverage in online ice hockey media where AHL executives have promoted the idea[4]
There are numerous difficulties associated with Spengler Cup participation of American Hockey League teams: travel costs incurred by the tournament organizer, the tight scheduling of the AHL, the adjustment AHL teams face in playing on a larger international ice surface, as well as jet lag (due to the change in time zone associated with travel) and altitude changes (Davos is located at an altitude of 5120 feet[5]- the closest AHL rink altitude is that of the Budweiser Events Center home of the Colorado Eagles at 4984 feet,[6] in Loveland, Colorado.