Credit Charles Wang for Helping to Get New York Islanders to Belmont Park, Says Ledecky

When the New York Islanders new arena opens at Belmont Park next fall, you can be sure there will be plenty of dignitaries on hand to celebrate the occasion. One who won’t be is former Islanders owner Charles Wang.

The late Islanders owner passed away on Oct. 21, 2018, after a battle with lung cancer.

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While Wang won’t be able to celebrate the Islanders return to Long Island and Nassau County, currant co-owner Jon Ledecky said on Wednesday that Wang deserves a lot of credit for getting them to Belmont Park. Ledecky was speaking at a Sports Business Journal virtual event when the comments were made.

“A salute to Charles Wang, the former owner of the Islanders who was our partner,” Ledecky said, according to NY SportsDay. “He was the one who suggested having a meeting with NYRA (New York Racing Association) to go and see the site and that really stimulated all of us about what the possibilities would be at that campus.”

It was Wang who had started looking at the idea of possibly building a new arena for the team at Belmont Park back in 2015, just as the Islanders were beginning their run at Barclays Center. Wang and NYRA board member Michael Dubb scouted the area in December of that year.

Several months later on a snowy day, Wang met with NYRA chief executive Christopher Kay.

“Charles deserves all the credit. The Islanders don’t come back to Long Island without Charles,” Dubb told Newsday in 2018 following Wang’s death.

Ledecky’s comments on Wednesday were also not his first praising Wang for the vision he had for the Islanders at the famed Long Island horse track. The current Islanders co-owner had a similar comment in 2018 as well.

“The arena at Belmont Park will be just one of (Charles Wang’s) many legacies left to the team and to Long Island,” Ledecky said in a statement at the time.

While Wang’s vision helped get the ball rolling, the Islanders do owe a debt of gratitude to the current governor of New York Andrew Cuomo. Gov. Cuomo has been one of the biggest — and most influential — supporters of the Islanders arena project.

It’s the most support the Islanders have had politically since former New York Gov. David Patterson threw some support behind the Lighthouse Project in 2009.

“Thank you to Governor Cuomo because without his vision of the need for the Islanders who had needed a new home for over two decades…his vision of going to Belmont and about recognizing Belmont as a site that could work, we wouldn’t be there right now,” Ledecky said during the SBJ event.