PHOENIX -- Another potential buyer has surfaced for the Phoenix Coyotes, one that would keep the team in Glendale, Ariz.
An attorney for Las Vegas-based businessman John Breslow, who owns 3 percent of the Coyotes, said Wednesday that Breslow told the NHL he has formed a group interested in submitting a bid for the team.
Attorney Scott Cohen declined to comment on reports that Breslow's group includes hockey great and Coyotes coach Wayne Gretzky. Breslow served as Nebraska state auditor from 1991 to 1999 and was a Republican candidate for governor of that state in 1998.
Coyotes owner Jerry Moyes filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection for the team earlier this month, a move that caught the NHL by surprise. The only bid so far for the team is a $212.5 million offer from Canadian Jim Balsillie, contingent on moving the team to Hamilton, Ontario.
Breslow was waiting for U.S. Bankruptcy Court judge Redfield Baum to finalize bidding procedures before proceeding, Cohen said.
The Breslow interest is separate from another potential purchasing group headed by Jerry Reinsdorf, owner of baseball's Chicago White Sox and the NBA's Chicago Bulls.
NHL deputy commissioner Bill Daly has said that he was on his way to present Moyes with a letter of intent from the Reinsdorf group when the bankruptcy petition was filed.
The purported Reinsdorf offer, which also would keep the team in Glendale, never has been made public.
The NHL did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Breslow's interest.
Baum has scheduled oral arguments June 22 on whether he should approve relocation of the team.
The NHL -- with the backing of the NFL, Major League Baseball and the NBA -- wants the judge to affirm that Balsillie must follow the league's rules for ownership and transfer of a franchise.
League attorney Tony Clark told the judge there is no way the league could approve moving the team in time for the coming season. The NHL wants to find a buyer who would keep the team in Glendale.
Breslow, who has served as chairman of Coyotes Charities, is former owner of Linweld, a Lincoln, Neb.-based company that sold welding supplies and manufactures industrial and medical gasses. The company, founded by Breslow's father in 1945, was sold to Matheson Tri-Gas of New Jersey in 2006.