Joe Louis Arena, nicknamed The Joe, and JLA, is a hockey arena located at 600 Civic Center Drive in Detroit, Michigan. It is the home of the National Hockey League franchise, the Detroit Red Wings. Completed in 1979 at a cost of $57 million, Joe Louis Arena is named after boxer and former heavyweight champion, Joe Louis, who grew up in Detroit.
In the arena's first season it hosted the NHL All-Star Game, which was played before a then-NHL record crowd of 21,002 and was made memorable when Gordie Howe of the Hartford Whalers was introduced on the Wales Conference line-up and received a ten-minute standing ovation. The 51-year-old Howe had played 25 years in Detroit, was the NHL's all-time leading scorer, and probably the most popular Red Wing of all time.
Joe Louis Arena is owned by the city of Detroit and operated by Olympia Entertainment, an Ilitch Holdings, Inc.-owned company. JLA replaced Olympia Stadium. It sits adjacent to Cobo Hall on the bank of the Detroit River and is accessible through its own station on the Detroit People Mover.
The Red Wings have been very successful since the move to JLA, winning three Stanley Cups (with two of them, 1997 and 2002, taking place with the Cup clinching victory at JLA). Budd Lynch is the arena's public address announcer.
Joe Louis Arena hosts college hockey events as part of College Hockey at The Joe and Great Lakes Invitational. It also played host to the 1980 Republican National Convention. More recently, WWE held Survivor Series 2005 on November 27, 2005.
The Detroit Pistons of the NBA used the arena for Game 5 of their 1984 playoff series against the New York Knicks when the Pontiac Silverdome was unavailable due to a scheduling conflict. In the game, Piston star Isiah Thomas scored 16 points in the final 1:34 of regulation to send the game into overtime before the Pistons lost. The Pistons were forced to return to Joe Louis Arena for 15 games during the 1984-85 season, after the roof of the Silverdome collapsed during a snowstorm.
Joe Louis Arena was the site of the decisive Game 5 of the 2006 WNBA Finals between the Sacramento Monarchs and Detroit Shock on September 9, due to The Palace of Auburn Hills (the Shock's usual home arena) already being used for a Mariah Carey concert on the same day. The Shock won the game 80-75 to clinch the championship.
Several plans for a replacement arena have surfaced in recent years, including proposals for the expansion of Cobo Hall that require JLA to be demolished. Currently, no firm plan for replacement or remodeling is in place.
