The potential buyer of the Phoenix Coyotes hopes a deal will be finalized with Glendale by mid-December, according to a minority investor who talked publicly for the first time with The Arizona Republic this week.

As hockey players streamed past from the Jobing.com Arena locker room to face the Edmonton Oilers Tuesday night, George Peinado said he is confident that an agreement between Glendale and the team's main buyer, Matthew Hulsizer, would be reached before the National Hockey League's Dec. 31 deadline.

The league has required Glendale, owner of the arena, to complete a lease with a new team owner by the end of the year. Otherwise, the league would begin talks with other cities, including Winnipeg, about relocating the franchise.

Glendale officials could not be reached for comment about the negotiations by press time.

Peinado, 40, was visiting the Valley on a two-night trip with his wife Julie to see the Coyotes for the first time. The managing director at Chicago private equity firm Madison Dearborn Partners plans to make a personal investment in the ownership group.

Peinado never played hockey - he's a soccer player. But his two children, ages 7 and 9, are in their second season of playing hockey, and Hulsizer, also 40, is the assistant coach for one of the teams. Peinado and Hulsizer, co-founder of Chicago firm PEAK6 Investments, live a mile from each other in Winnetka, Ill.

Peinado said his kids claimed Coyotes fandom the minute the family got involved in going after the team.

Hulsizer has formed a group of eight to 10 investors with a passion for the game and sharp business skills to turn around the team's finances should he take ownership, Peinado said.

Hulsizer "wants people who are going to be engaged," he said. "We're friends, we're neighbors, and I'm an investor of consumer businesses."

Peinado said the team needs stability, which a new owner would provide.

"Whether it's players, employees or fans, for the longest time, people didn't know what was going to happen," he said.

Changes would likely be on the business operations side, not in the locker room, according to Peinado.

"This is going to be an ownership group that intends in no way to get too involved in the hockey side of it," he said. "The hockey piece seems to be working really well."

Peinado praised General Manager Don Maloney and Coach Dave Tippett, who won league awards for leading the team to a winning season and the first round of playoffs last year. Later Tuesday night, the Coyotes beat the Oilers 5-0, racking up a seven-game winning streak.

But "the business side of it needs some help," Peinado said, including marketing the team, re-branding its image and increasing sales.

Former team owner Jerry Moyes put the Coyotes into bankruptcy in May 2009 after losing tens of millions of dollars each season. The NHL paid the team's expenses until this summer, when it demanded Glendale put aside $25 million to cover team and arena losses. Two other buyer groups have failed to reach deals with the city. Hulsizer took the lead this past summer.

Hulsizer's investor group has gone back to the NHL "to tweak some things" in their agreement based on talks with Glendale, but the purchase price for the team - said to be at least $165 million - is still in place, Peinado said.

"It's really now just Glendale," he said.

Peinado would not elaborate on the details under negotiation with the city.

Terms with past bidders included parking fees, higher ticket prices, and a special taxing district around the Westgate City Center area to increase revenues for the franchise and the city. The deals also required changing the team name from Phoenix Coyotes to Arizona Coyotes or Glendale Coyotes.

One past deal, with Chicago sports mogul Jerry Reinsdorf allowed him to move the team if it was not profitable after five years, while a separate deal with investor group Ice Edge Holdings required the team to stay in Glendale for the remaining 24 years of the lease.

Glendale could call a special meeting with 24 hours' notice to vote on a lease, or at a regularly scheduled public meeting. The next one is Dec. 14.

Peinado said the lease agreement expected next month with Glendale will be a final draft, unlike agreements the city negotiated before. Reinsdorf and Ice Edge both presented outlines of lease terms to the City Council for a vote, intending to work out final details afterward.

One more step is for Hulsizer to gain approval from the NHL Board of Governors, made up of the owners of the 29 other teams, to become owner. The next regularly scheduled governors meeting is Dec. 6-7 in Florida, although the board is able to vote remotely by fax or phone at any time.