Jay H. Feaster Executive Vice President & General Manager
Birth date: 26 Oct 1963 Birth place: Williamstown

Jay Feaster enters his seventh year as the Executive Vice President & General Manager of the Tampa Bay Lightning. Under his guidance Tampa Bay has not only made their first postseason appearance since the
1996-97 season, but has qualified for the Stanley Cup Playoffs in each of the previous four seasons. The Lightning enjoyed a storybook season under Feaster in 2003-04, winning a second consecutive Southeast Division title, capturing the top seed in the Eastern Conference and skating off with Lord Stanley’s Cup after a hard-fought seven game series against the Calgary Flames.

In recognition of his managerial moves and the stability he brought to the Lightning, Feaster was named the NHL Executive of the Year by The Sporting News in a vote of his peers following the 2003-04 regular season. He also ranked second among general managers in pro sports by Forbes Magazine in an article published on March 5, 2007. Feaster had a busy off-season in 2007 as he concentrated on building the team’s depth. He signed free agents Michel Ouellet, Jan Hlavac and Brad Lukowich who each have significant NHL experience and he also added former Lightning captain Chris Gratton in a trade with Florida. He also bolstered the team’s overall depth by signing free agent defensemen Dan Jancevski, Jay Leach, David Schneider, and forwards Craig MacDonald and Mathieu Darche. He also acquired defenseman Bryce Lampman in a trade with the New York Rangers. Feaster has been widely praised for bringing continuity and stability to a Lightning franchise that had been anything but stable prior to his ascension to the General Manager’s office. Feaster, a native of Williamstown, PA, was honored for his success during a summer of 2004 parade in his hometown as he brought the Stanley Cup home for
all to see and touch. He has also served on the USA Hockey International Council where he worked directly with the chairman to help guide the activities of the International Council.

Feaster, named General Manager on February 10, 2002, joined the Lightning on October 20, 1998, from the Hershey Bears of the American Hockey League. He spent three-plus seasons as Tampa Bay’s assistant general manager, overseeing all contractual, collective bargaining and NHL legal issues, as well as the organization’s scouting department and its minor league affiliates in Detroit (International Hockey League), Springfield (AHL), and Pensacola (East Coast Hockey League). As the fourth General Manager in the history of the Lightning, Feaster has developed the Lightning into one of the most competitive and entertaining teams in the NHL while also securing the future through affiliation agreements with the Norfolk Admirals and Mississippi Sea Wolves. He has built a team that works hard every shift of every game with individuals dedicated to the team objectives. Feaster, who served as co-General Manager of Team USA for the 2003 World Championships, has reaffirmed the organization’s desire to build from within while placing his stamp on the organization by adding to the franchise’s depth. He also solidified the team’s goaltending by adding Johan Holmqvist and Marc Denis, with 2004 draft-pick Karri Ramo knocking on the door.

To join the Lightning, Feaster, 45, resigned his post as president of the Bears and vice president of Hershey Sports and Entertainment. In that capacity, Feaster oversaw the operations of the Hershey Bears, the Hershey Wildcats professional soccer team and Hershey Park Arena/Stadium, including the Star Pavilion. Feaster, who spent nine years with the Bears, led the team to a division title (1993-94) and a Calder Cup Championship (1997), while establishing three consecutive single-season attendance records (1991-92 - 1993-94) and entering into a five-year affiliation agreement with the NHL’s Colorado Avalanche. The affiliation agreement allowed Feaster to work closely with and learn from Avalanche General Manager Pierre Lacroix. For his work, Feaster was named the AHL’s Executive of the Year in 1997. One of Feaster’s head coaches, Bob Hartley, made the jump directly from the Bears to head coach of the Colorado Avalanche, leading the Avalanche to the 2001 Stanley Cup title, while another of Feaster’s former head coaches, Bill Barber, was named the 2001 Jack Adams Award winner. Barber now serves as the Lightning’s Director of Player Personnel while Hartley is now the coach of division rival Atlanta.

Feaster originally joined the Hershey Company as assistant to the president in 1989, and was named general manager of the Bears and Hershey Park Arena/Stadium on September 1, 1990. As general manager of the 7,256-seat Hershey Park Arena and 25,000-capacity Hershey Park Stadium, Feaster led the historic facilities to record gross revenue performances in the year-end facility rankings compiled by Amusement Business magazine. During his tenure as general manager, Hershey Park Arena moved steadily up the charts from fifth in 1992 to fourth in 1993 and third in 1994 in world ranking of arenas with 5,001-10,000 seats. Over the same three years, Hershey Park Stadium climbed from eighth to second to first in the world for stadiums with 40,000 or fewer seats.

In 1996, Feaster negotiated the purchase of an A-League American Professional Soccer League (APSL) Division II franchise by Herco, the Hershey Wildcats, and then served on the A-League committee
responsible for finalizing the merger between the APSL and USISL, Inc. In launching the Wildcats, Feaster hired the club’s first general manager, who went on to become the A-League Executive of the Year in his
first season in soccer management and later moved on to manage a team in the MLS. The team’s first year Head Coach was named A-League Coach of the Year. In their inaugural season (1997), the Wildcats finished 19-9 and won the Atlantic Division regular season title. Feaster also served the newly constituted A-League as a member of its Executive Committee until his departure for Tampa.

Prior to joining the Hershey Company, Feaster practiced law with the firm of McNees, Wallace & Nurick in Harrisburg, PA. Feaster is a Summa Cum Laude graduate of Susquehanna University and a Cum Laude graduate of The Georgetown Law Center in Washington, D.C. While in Hershey, Feaster spent time on the advisory boards of the Big 33 Scholarship Foundation, the Four Diamonds Fund at the Pennsylvania State University Milton S. Hershey Medical Center, and the Central PA Chapter of the National Multiple Sclerosis Society. He also taught business law and hotel law as a visiting faculty member at the Lebanon Valley College in Annville, PA.

Jay and his wife, Anne, have five children - Theresa (15), Bobby (13), Libby (11), Ryan (7) and Kevin (3) and reside in Valrico, Florida.