BATON ROUGE - The Raising Cane's River Center announced Monday they're taking submissions for a contest to name Baton Rouge's new hockey team.

“Well it’s the communities team and the community should certainly have a say and a large say at that," Raising Cane's River Center General Manager Wayne Hodes said. "In the first hour we got a thousand submissions already for the team name.” 

Last summer, owner Barry Soskin hosted three exhibition hockey games at the River Center to test the market with the possibility of bringing a team to Baton Rouge.

“This is about Baton Rouge and the team that they wanted. We came here last summer and we tried a few games and we said if you guys want hockey please support it and we’ll bring a team here. The numbers were outstanding,” Soskin said.

Submissions will open Monday at www.raisingcanesrivercenter.com/brprohockey and will close by midnight April 30. There is no limit to the number of submissions per person, and all submissions will be considered by the team’s staff.

“The Baton Rouge Red Sticks, I think that would be a great team name,” fan Brady Ramon said.

"We’re thinking the Baton Rouge Bengals because why not? Purple and gold, I’m already wearing the hat, everybody would be locked in. You don’t have to buy new gear and everyone can rep the purple and gold at the River Center,” fan Chris Sagrera said.

This isn’t Baton Rouge’s first shot at a hockey team. The Baton Rouge Kingfish, named after former Governor, Huey P. Long, played at the then Riverside Centroplex for seven years before being relocated. Now that another team is taking over, many are wondering what will make it work this time around.

"Barry Soskin the team owner has been involved in professional sports, minor league hockey in particular for 25 years with numerous successful teams and he has a few teams invested in this league, he’s in it for the long haul. We didn’t want what happened 20 years ago to potentially happen again and I think this puts us in a position for the best opportunity for the long haul and success,” Hodes said.

The official team name will be selected and announced in May, and the team will start playing in October as part of the Federal Prospect Hockey League.

"We are excited to bring hockey to Baton Rouge, and we believe that the community will
embrace our team with open arms," team owner Barry Soskin said in a statement. "We can't wait to see what our fans come up with, and we look forward to announcing our new team name in the coming weeks."

Read the full announcement here.