Atlantic Schooners The Atlantic Schooners were a conditional Canadian Football League expansion team that was to begin play in 1984 out of Halifax , Nova Scotia . On May 13 , 1982 , Maritime Professional Football Club Ltd . was granted a conditional expansion franchise . The team was to pay a $ 1 . 5 million expansion fee and could begin play in 1984 if a suitable stadium was built in time for the league opener . The team name was derived from a name - the - team contest in which " schooner " was the winning selection . The logo was a stylized " A " in the shape of a schooner that rode on four waves , each representing the four Atlantic provinces , Nova Scotia , New Brunswick , Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland . Acadia Axemen coach John Huard was named the team ' s first head coach . The Schooners proposed home was a 30 , 000 - seat stadium located on leased land in the city of Dartmouth , Nova Scotia . The owners purchased a scoreboard from the New England Patriots for use in their new stadium . The Schooners were unable to meet the deadlines set by the league , including the deadline for a financing plan for the new stadium . On June 16 , 1983 , Maritime Professional Football Club Ltd . officially withdrew their application for a franchise . Since then there have been endless rumours of a stadium being built in the area and with it , a CFL team , although none has yet been built . Fan desire for a team in the region remains strong . There is a group on Facebook that was formed in hopes of building a stadium and starting a franchise . It has over 3 , 700 members . One urban legend around the Halifax area is that the old scoreboard from the Foxboro Stadium is in a warehouse in Dartmouth , Nova Scotia , left there awaiting the proposed stadium . Another legend is that J . I . Albrecht had already bought turf for the stadium . When the club folded he took the turf and threw it into the Atlantic Ocean . On June 11 , 2005 , a CFL exhibition game , called " Touchdown Atlantic " between the Toronto Argonauts and Hamilton Tiger - Cats , was held in Halifax . This game served as a gauge for possible CFL expansion . The venue was Huskies Stadium ( capacity 11 000 ) on the campus of St . Mary ' s University . Tickets for the event , which cost upwards of $ 60 . 00 , sold out rapidly . The game ended in a 16 - 16 tie . Another CFL exhibition game would have taken place on June 3 , 2006 , but the suspension of the Ottawa Renegades , who were scheduled to play the game , forced the game to be cancelled altogether . If Halifax had landed the 2014 Commonwealth Games , a stadium likely would have been built for the event , which would have removed a major hurdle facing Atlantic Canada ' s chances of getting a franchise ; however , Halifax withdrew its bid for the games in early March 2007 . Nevertheless , a Schooners delegation took part in the festivities at the 2007 Grey Cup . A ninth CFL team has been located in Ottawa , meaning were the Schooners to join the league they would become the tenth club . The CFL has been extremely cautious about expansion in recent years , following the failed expansion into the United States of the mid 1990s and the failure of the Ottawa Renegades in 2005 . It is believed that the league are keen to have a tenth team ( Ottawa is slated to return to the CFL with a revamped franchise no later than 2013 , which would give the league nine teams ) , with five in the eastern division and five in the west . This has been seen as supportive of the idea of a team in Halifax making the league " truly national " . Also in the Atlantic region of Canada , Moncton , New Brunswick ( a city that is roughly from Halifax , which is slightly longer than the distance between Ottawa and Montreal ) , built a 20 , 000 - seat stadium ( New Moncton Stadium ) to host the IAAF 2010 World Junior Championships in Athletics . . There is also hope that the stadium will help land a CFL team for the city , someday . In pursuit of luring the CFL to expand to Moncton , a regular season game dubbed Touchdown Atlantic was played between the Toronto Argonauts and the Edmonton Eskimos on September 26 , 2010 . The game was won by Edmonton 24 - 6 . There are plans for a new game to be hosted by Moncton in 2011 , with the details of the teams that will be playing to be announced with the release of the CFL ' s 2011 schedule .