The NHL tonight announced the radical realignment plan that’s been rumored for a few days.
The new four-conference alignment and playoff format was approved by the Board of Governors and now requires NHLPA agreement.
If approved, Florida and Tampa Bay will be joining the current five Northeast Division teams under this plan. The Atlantic Division teams will be joined by Washington and Carolina. The playoff format will be within conference in a 1 vs. 4 and 2 vs. 3 format. The conference winners will then re-seed for the NHL semifinals and final.
Teams within the seven-team division will meet six times. Non-conference games will be home-and-home for everyone. So the Bruins will play longtime rivals the New York Rangers, Philadelphia Flyers and Pittsburgh Penguins just twice a season — but they’ll have six games a year with the Panthers and Lightning.
Here’s the full conference alignment:
•New Jersey, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, New York Rangers, New York Islanders, Washington and Carolina
•Boston, Montreal, Toronto, Ottawa, Buffalo, Florida and Tampa Bay
•Detroit, Columbus, Nashville, St. Louis, Chicago, Minnesota, Dallas and Winnipeg
•Los Angeles, Anaheim, Phoenix, San Jose, Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton, Colorado
I think the Yotes will stay out west, maybe Seattle/Portland. We’ll get the new Panther team. That’ll leave TB down there by themselves which doesn’t make a lot of sense. Maybe a realignment of the realignment?
Probably ours as a new Nordiques team
I wonder which division the Yotes will eventually end up in when they get a new owner.
The scheduling will be interesting.
I like it. It reminds me of the old divisions, Adams, etc. Now, you win your “conference” (read: division) and then the remaining teams move on.
The old Atlantic is clearly the toughest division, with the far west division a close second.
I just hope they dont come up with stupid names for them. The best would be if they returned to the old names
Seems too gimmicky to me, and too constrained as far as who the opponents could be in those first two playoff rounds.
I’d way rather see the NHL stick with something as close as possible to what is already in place, and try to develop a little tradition and continuity there.
Apparently the idea is to add a couple more teams and fill out conferences “C” and “D” in the future…. that is until they change the structure yet again?
I’m really not so happy with this format, since we have decent to pretty good rivalries with a few of the Atlantic division teams, most importantly, Philly. Taking 2 of those games away every year is kind of a big deal to me, since they are usually excellent, edge-of-your-seat type hockey. On the upside, the TB games are also generally the same way, and these two teams are starting to develop a rivalry that is thus far mostly respectful. Ah well, it will be nice to see every team every year, and now featuring fewer opportunities for Matt Cooke to try and end Bruins careers.
Not a fan of the playoff format. I guess I’m looking forward to seeing Boston come to Vancouver once a year, but I also like the way things are currently set up, in terms of division/conference structure, etc. Oh well. At least the primary rivalries are intact.
I like the home and home with each team. It was great to get to see the Bruins in Detroit last year, and I look forward to the chance to do that every year. That said, I don’t love being stuck with the two Florida teams. Who physically can stick with the Bruins in that division. All of the physical teams got put together in the other one.
I think the NE division was the least affected by this, it’s going to be a bloodbath getting out of that old Atlantic division.
lame.