A family-owned, Winnetka-based private equity firm is closing in on a deal to purchase the Pittsburgh Penguins from Fenway Sports Group.
Multiple outlets, including Victory Sports and ESPN, citing anonymous sources, reported Wednesday that the Hoffmann Family of Companies is nearing the final stages of an agreement to purchase one of the league’s marquee franchises. Any purchase would need to be approved by the NHL’s Board of Governors, though that is often merely a formality.
The financial details have not been released, though the Penguins were valued at around $1.7 billion recently by Forbes.
The sale, if completed, would end FSG’s brief run as stewards of the five-time Stanley Cup-winning franchise. FSG, which owns Major League Baseball’s Boston Red Sox and Liverpool of the Premier League, agreed to purchase the Penguins from Ron Burkle and Hall of Famer Mario Lemieux in late 2021.
The terms of that sale were not announced, though the team was valued at around $845 million by Sportico at that time.
The Hoffmann Family, which counts the ECHL’s Florida Everblades among the many companies it runs, will pay considerably more than that to become the team’s third owner in a half-decade. The Hoffmann company has a primary office in Winnetka and has a headquarters in Naples, Fla.
The sale comes with the Penguins in a bit of a transitional period as the era defined by stars Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and Kris Letang nears its end. The trio — who are playing their 20th season together as teammates — have guided the club to three Stanley Cups (2009, 2016 and 2017), though Pittsburgh has not reached the playoffs since 2022 and hasn’t won a postseason series since 2018.
The Penguins are in the midst of an overhaul orchestrated by general manager Kyle Dubas. They parted ways with two-time Stanley Cup-winning coach Mike Sullivan last spring and are off to a better-than-expected start under first-year coach Dan Muse, though they are currently riding a six-game losing streak heading into a road trip that begins on Thursday at Ottawa.
Attendance has dipped since the club’s 633-game sellout streak ended in October 2021. The Penguins are currently playing to about 88% capacity this season at PPG Paints Arena, the third-lowest percentage in the league.
It’s expected that Lemieux will retain some financial stake in the club, as he did when the team was sold to FSG. Lemieux’s role during FSG’s tenure was nebulous, though he has been around more frequently of late as Crosby neared Lemieux’s franchise points record.
Crosby has 1,722 career points, one shy of Lemieux’s total of 1,723.
Lemieux, who led the team to a pair of Stanley Cups in 1991 and 1992, remains beloved in Pittsburgh, where a statue of him sits outside one of the gates at PPG Paints Arena, which was built during his tenure as one of the club’s majority owners.