SEATTLE — Bustling, bruising, big-time hockey in this foggy, tech-loving, latte-sipping city?

When you think of professional sports in Seattle, Pete Carroll, Russell Wilson and the Seahawks may come to mind. Or maybe your memory drifts to Ken Griffey Jr. batting for the Mariners.

Perhaps, as so many people in this town do, you remember ghosts of the N.B.A.: Gary Payton, Shawn Kemp, Downtown Freddie Brown. But the SuperSonics have been gone for a decade. In 2008, they shuffled off, ignominiously, to Oklahoma City to be reborn as the Thunder.

Now, though, Seattle, which has pined for a replacement on the hardwood for 10 years, will finally have a new squad to root for — but it will play on ice and specialize in slap shots, not slam dunks.

You want to talk about ghosts? The illustrious, if little-known, Seattle Metropolitans were the first American hockey team to hoist the Stanley Cup. But that was in 1917. Hockey, at its highest level, hasn’t been played here for nearly a century.