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New NHL Conferences

Conference 1: Toronto, Montreal, Ottawa, Buffalo, Boston, Florida, and Tampa Bay

Conference 2: New York Rangers, New York Islanders, New Jersey, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Washington, and Carolina

Conference 3: Anaheim, Los Angeles, San Jose, Phoenix, Colorado, Vancouver, Calgary, and Edmonton

Conference 4: Dallas, St. Louis, Chicago, Minnesota, Winnipeg, Nashville, Detroit, and Columbus

The above is the agreed upon new NHL conference alignment that will come into effect for the 2012-2013 season. During the regular season, teams will play in every NHL arena at least once, a home and away series. In the 7 team conferences, each team will play each other 6 times, 3 home and 3 away. In the 8 team conferences, teams will play each other 5 or 6 times on a rotating basis. The first two rounds of the playoffs will be inside the individual conferences, with 1vs4, and 2vs3, and the winners playing out there to become the conference champion. What happens beyond that still has not been finalized, one suggestion is re-seeding the 4 conferences and again play out 1vs4, and 2vs3, with the winner from those two rounds becoming the Stanley Cup Champion. Also there is pairing the western conference champions and the eastern conference champions.

There are pros and cons to the new set up, the biggest pro being that every team will see all the other teams at least twice, once at home and once on the road. It minimizes travel for teams, not having the travel as much to the different time zones. The biggest hamper for that were the Detroit Red Wings, Nashville Predators, and Columbus Blue Jackets, having to travel to Mountain, and Pacific time zones hindered their fans ability to watch games and thus affected revenues. The biggest con would be redundancy that could result from the conferences, having the same 4 teams come out of the conferences would get old pretty quick. Another one, the loss of the “Cinderella” team, that 8^th seed toppling the number 1 seed and making it to the cup finals, a la Edmonton Oilers in 2006, that one team that fans can get behind.

There is still pending approval from the NHLPA and minor changes still are possible, but the above conferences should not change dramatically.

By: Al-Rahim Bandali

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