Armstrong says ‘we’ve always set high standards’ with eye on playoff run
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TORONTO — The Utah Mammoth are out to prove that the momentum the team is riding after just one month of the regular season is no fluke, both on the ice and off.
In its inaugural season in Salt Lake City after relocating from Arizona, Utah’s young core showed plenty of growth in finishing a respectable 38-31-13 for 89 points, including an impressive 6-2-2 to finish the 2024-25 season. While it still left them seven points behind the St. Louis Blues for the second wild card into the Stanley Cup Playoffs from the Western Conference, general manager Bill Armstrong’s team was trending in the right direction.
It’s a wave of improvement that the Mammoth have carried into this season, one the entire organization hopes will bring playoff hockey to the Delta Center. That particular quest for the postseason will continue when Utah visits the Toronto Maple Leafs at Scotiabank Arena on Wednesday (7 p.m. ET; TVAS, SN, Utah16).
“We’re our biggest critics on the inside,” Armstrong said in a 1-on-1 with NHL.com. “Nobody has higher standards than we do. So we’ve always set high standards in our organization, and we’re not afraid to put them out there and challenge.
“We want to make the playoffs. That’s our goal. We feel like our team is good enough to take that step. The Central Division is hard. You’re going to need a little bit of luck. But usually, if your team works, you find that luck. So obviously, yeah, we want to do that.
“We were disappointed last year when we didn’t get in. It’s all about consistency and not getting too high, not too low, and see what we can do. The season is young yet, but we’re off to a good start.”
In so many different ways.
Consider how much has happened to the franchise in the past few months alone.
First off, it is now known as the Mammoth, not the Utah Hockey Club as it was called a season ago. Prior to their home opener against the Calgary Flames at the Delta Center on Oct. 15, they unveiled their new mascot Tusky, a 6-foot-5 mammoth that busted out of a block of ice.
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The Mammoth kicked off a franchise-record seven-game winning streak that same night, a run that helped Utah get out to an impressive 9-4-0 start following a 2-1 overtime win at the Buffalo Sabres on Tuesday.
Armstrong said the players are buoyed by co-owners Ryan and Ashley Smith living up to their promises of improving the facilities by making the Delta Center configuration more hockey-friendly for fans and providing a state-of-the-art practice center for the team.
They’re also investing in the roster as well.
On Oct. 29, forward Logan Cooley, who has 12 points (eight goals, four assists) in 13 games, signed an eight-year, $80 million contract. It has an average annual value of $10 million and begins next season.
UTA@EDM: Cooley gives Mammoth lead in opening period
Through it all, the Salt Lake City community continues to embrace the team as its own, snapping up the new Mammoth jerseys and selling out the Delta Center for home games. On Saturday, they collectively were in full voice when Cooley and teammate Dylan Guenther joined ESPN’s “College Gameday” show at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City, making on-air predictions for the Utah-Cincinnati game and presenting interviewer Jess Sims with her own customized Mammoth jersey.
“If you went to a game, hopefully you come in and watch us play, you’ll think we’ve been there for 30 years,” Armstrong said. “Everybody’s got a jersey on. They got the chants going. It’s all about the team. It looks and feels like we’ve been there forever.
“Part of the enthusiasm probably comes a little bit from the way we play. We’re young, we’re fast, we play an energy game.”
A style which the 21-year-old Cooley and 22-year-old Guenther are embracing.
“When you do this job, you find out a lot about a player early on in his career, about his dedication,” Armstrong said. “Is it the money he’s playing for, or is it to win? And when you get the right guy that you believe in, or the right guys, I should say, you want to lock them up.
“And whether it’s Guenther, who’s in his first year of his own eight-year deal, or Cooley, they’re really good kids. They’re hockey kids. They dream of one thing, and that’s raising the Stanley Cup. And so I like the aspect of what those guys bring every single day to the rink.
“They energize you by watching them. They’re out there to get better. On their bad nights, they’ll be the first ones to admit it, and when they get back to the rink, they get working to improve. So I like our team in the sense that we do have some guys locked down long term, building blocks that you can move forward with.”
Just another example of how the Mammoth franchise is doing exactly that.
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