Portland, ME – It sort of like your current girlfriend dumping you only to go back to their longtime ex.

After a three-year affiliation with the Portland Pirates, the Buffalo Sabres are heading back to Rochester, NY where they spent nearly three decades before coming to Portland in 2008.

The American Hockey League Board of Governors unanimously approved the transfer of ownership from Curt Styres and Arrow Express Sports to the Terry Pegula and the Buffalo Sabres.

As was originally reported last night on Maine Hockey Journal, besides the announcement of the purchase, the Sabres will hold a press conference early next week to layout of the future for that organization.

“We are pleased to welcome Terry Pegula and the Buffalo Sabres as owners in the American Hockey League,” said AHL president Dave Andrews in a statement released after the vote. “The Rochester Americans and Buffalo Sabres have a rich history together, and reuniting these two outstanding franchises is great news for hockey fans in western New York.”

The deal to purchase the Amerks had been in the works for nearly seven months before being completed less than a week ago. Pirates Managing Owner and CEO Brian Petrovek said he was first made aware of the process for the Sabres to purchase the Amerks back in early November while Pegula was performing his due process on the purchase of the Sabres.

“This essentially is in lock step to the process that Terry was undergoing to purchase the franchise from (former owner Tom) Golisano and when the Golisano group got to the point where Terry was to a level of seriousness they gave me the heads up that Terry’s vision included the probability of returning his player development program back to Rochester, NY,” said Petrovek.

“It was at that point we indicated to Terry and his group that we would in no way prevent that from happening,” said Petrovek. “It was the right thing for Terry Pegula. If I was sitting in Terry’s shoes and had his financial wherewithal I would probably be looking at the same thing. So in the best interest in our league and the Buffalo Sabres I would never put our franchise in a position to where we would have stopped (the sale).”

The Pirates and Sabres had recently extended their affiliation agreement last spring for three more years with a Sabres option for two more. Because of that, it required the Sabres to buyout their deal existing deal with the Pirates, but as Petrovek described it. The process was amicable.

“We had a long term deal, but in the best interest of the Buffalo Sabres and their desire to develop their players differently, their desire to return to a Rochester market to have their player development only 70 miles down the road, and from our prospective as an independent owner to see the Rochester market become rejuvenated and revitalized under Sabres ownership it became very important for us,” said Petrovek. “It was the right thing to do.”

“It only took a couple conversations on what it would take to release and terminate (from the affiliation agreement), and as you would expect with the relationship we had with the seller and the buyer that was the easy part. We found common ground on how about going about doing this. It was very simple. We moved on to the bigger task of making sure Rochester and Buffalo would come together, and we could find somebody we were going to feel really comfortable about moving forward.”

The move now closes a three-year chapter in the Pirates history where they enjoyed immense success on the ice and off.

During that span, the Pirates posted a 131-79-17-13 record, making three appearances in the Calder Cup playoffs and winning the Atlantic Division in 2011-‘12. The Pirates also became one of three franchises in the AHL to ever have three consecutive Dudley (Red) Garrett Memorial Award winners for Outstanding Rookie.

“It was an incredible experience from the first day I met with (former president) Larry Quinn and (Sabres GM) Darcy (Regier) in a restaurant in Boston, and we had a deal done in an hour and a half,” Petrovek said. The bar has been raised (by Buffalo) and the last thing that our organization and our new NHL partner are going to do is let our fans down. They are going, starting on Monday afternoon, take it from where Buffalo left off and hopefully continue those good thoughts and good results that we had with the Buffalo Sabres.”