Five seasons, told in order — from the first-year team that crashed the President's Cup Final, through the 50-win year that should have been a beginning, to the January night in 2001 when the franchise folded mid-schedule. Records, rosters, and the newspaper account of each.
Franchise totals · 5 seasons
The seasons
The Last Rodeo
2000-2001 Season
14-19-5 record · 33 points · 108 goals for, 133 against
Coach Todd Lalonde
Thirty-eight games into what was supposed to be another seventy-game season, the Stampede folded. The wins came harder than they had any right to come — Todd Lalonde's group kept playing real hockey through the unraveling — but the business that ran the team could no longer afford the team. Five years ended at the Bell County Expo Center on January 6, 2001.
Read about the 2000-2001 season →
Fifty Wins Through the Noise
1999-2000 Season
50-17-3 record · 103 points · 282 goals for, 187 against
Coach Todd Lalonde
The fourth season was the best one. With ownership in trouble behind the scenes, the Stampede answered with 50 wins, 103 points, a Central Division title, and a league MVP in 22-year-old Ron Newhook. The Bell County Expo Center became one of the hardest buildings in the WPHL to leave with a win. By any standard the franchise had reached its ceiling. It just didn't know that's what it was doing.
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Holding the Line
1998-1999 Season
33-24-12 record · 78 points · 286 goals for, 266 against
Coach Glen Williamson
The WPHL had doubled in size, the road games got longer, and the easy wins from year one were gone. Glen Williamson's club ground out 78 points through one of the deepest schedules the league would ever play, leaning on franchise pillar Gerald Tallaire to keep things steady. It was the kind of season that doesn't produce highlights so much as proof of character.
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No Second-Year Slump
1997-1998 Season
40-23-6 record · 86 points · 258 goals for, 251 against
Coach Lee Norwood
The sophomore-year test for any new team is whether the first season was real. Central Texas answered with 40 wins under former NHL defenseman Lee Norwood — better than the inaugural campaign by every measure that mattered except the one Belton wanted most. The Stampede had become a tough night out for the rest of the WPHL. They were not going away.
Read about the 1997-1998 season →
The First Stampede
1996-1997 Season
35-27-2 record · 72 points · 243 goals for, 229 against
Coach Bob Bourne
A first-year franchise in a football state. The Stampede were supposed to spend 1996-97 learning the league. Bob Bourne's roster spent it winning — 35 games in the regular season and a march all the way to the President's Cup Finals. Central Texas met professional hockey, and professional hockey met something it hadn't planned for.
Read about the 1996-1997 season →
