Canadian Tire Centre sits just west of downtown Ottawa and is the home of the Senators, one of the NHL's return franchises in Canada's capital. The suburban arena draws a passionate, red-and-black crowd that treats hockey nights as a civic event in a city defined by its winters. It's a straightforward hockey-first building without much frill, but the atmosphere ramps up considerably come playoff time. Its location, a short drive from downtown, makes it a regional gathering point for fans across the Ottawa Valley and western Quebec.
The arena opened in January 1996 as the Palladium, quickly renamed the Corel Centre and later Scotiabank Place before becoming Canadian Tire Centre in 2013. Its defining moment came in 2007, when it hosted home games of the Senators' only trip to the Stanley Cup Final, a series they lost to the Anaheim Ducks. Capacity expansions in the mid-2000s pushed seating past 19,000, among the larger buildings in the NHL. Despite the franchise's ups and downs since, the arena remains the beating heart of hockey in Canada's capital.
Source: RateGame editorial