Exactly 75 days after pause was pressed on the season, the NHL became the first major North American pro sports league to unveil its formal return-to-play plan on Tuesday.
There is no guarantee the NHL makes it back to complete this season, but there is a plan. Bettman outlined the 24-team format, details on the Draft Lottery, and the official conclusion of the 2019-20 regular season.
“We hope this is a step back towards normalcy,” NHL commissioner Gary Bettman said.
Here is all of that information and more boiled down into some FAQs:
> When will the NHL return to the ice?
For the first time, Bettman revealed a best-case timeline. He said training camps will begin “not earlier than the first half of July.”
Players have asked for a three-week training camp. If that request remains intact after they begin training in small groups next month, then the earliest the puck can drop is in late July or early August.
“We view this more as a continuum than absolute dates, because anyone that is giving you dates is guessing,” Bettman said. “It’s conceivable that we’re playing at the end of July. Maybe things open up quicker. If it has to slide more, then it will slide.”
> What is the 24-team format?
The top 12 teams in each conference will compete in either a seeding round-robin or a qualifying (“play-in”) round to determine the 16 teams that will ultimately compete for the Stanley Cup.
The top four teams in each conference will play for first-round seeding using regular season overtime rules.
The remaining eight teams in each conference will play a best-of-five series to advance to the first round of the playoffs, using overtime rules.
The format of the first and second rounds of the playoffs is still to be determined. The NHL and NHL Players’ Association are negotiating on whether it will be best-of-five or best-of-seven series, plus whether it will be a bracket format or seeding.
The Conference Finals and Stanley Cup Final will both be the usual best-of-seven series.
> How will the top four seeds be determined?
The top four teams will play a three-game round robin that will determine their seeding and first-round matchup.
It will be possible, Bettman conceded, that the current No. 4 seed Philadelphia Flyers end up as the No. 1 seed in the East to begin the playoffs – even though they finished 11 points behind the Boston Bruins, the best team in the East – and the entire league – in the regular season.
Only in the event of a round-robin tiebreaker will regular season points percentage impact the seeding. This format came as a result of top-four teams not wanting to be at a disadvantage with a bye.
“They needed some games that mattered, to not be coming in against a team that just played a competitive series,” Bettman said. “The benefit and the curse of a bye, I suppose.”
> Where will these games be played?
Each conference will be assigned a “hub” city that is designed to operate as a bubble for players and team personnel, with secure hotels, arena, practice facilities and in-market transportation.
The two hub cities will be selected from 10 candidates: Chicago, Columbus, Dallas, Edmonton, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Minneapolis/St.Paul, Pittsburgh, Toronto or Vancouver.
Bettman also said that it remains possible for the Conference Final and Stanley Cup Final to be played in the cities of the teams that are competing.
> Three of the NHL’s 10 hub city candidates are in Canada. Will Canada be home to one of the host cities?
The current federal 14-day mandatory quarantine for all persons entering Canada is presenting a roadblock.
“We would certainly like to have a city in Canada,” deputy commissioner Bill Daly said. “We’re in discussions with the Canadian government at this point in time on that issue. If we’re not able to resolve or solve that issue, I think it effectively eliminates our ability to come to a Canadian city as one of our hub cities.”
Bettman said the NHL has three or four weeks to decide on hub cities. That may be enough time to find a creative solution or see restrictions loosened in that time, something that the NHL would certainly be interested in given the costs to resume play and a favourable Canadian dollar exchange rate for the league.
> Would teams be barred from playing in their own hub city?
To be determined. Without fans in the stands, there may not be much of a “home-ice advantage,” but the league is sensitive to potential competitive advantages of using their home base.
“We certainly see some merit to moving the club to a different market,” Daly said, “so any perceived advantages associated with being in a home market are eliminated.”
Added Bettman: “If a team happens to be the home market, I don’t think the players should be planning on [staying at] home. They’ll be staying in the same [hotel] conditions that everybody else is.”
> What will the Draft Lottery look like?
Tuesday was good news for the Ottawa Senators, who will have a combined 25 per cent shot at the No. 1 pick and Alexis Lafreniere when the Draft Lottery is held on June 26.
The Draft Lottery rules are complicated. But all 15 non-playoff teams – including the eight teams that lose in the qualifying round tournament – will have a chance at the first, second and third overall picks.
Since the eight teams who lose in qualifying are involved, a second phase of the Draft Lottery may be required. If one of those eight teams wins one of the first three lotteries, a second lottery will be held – with equal odds assigned to each team – to determine which one of those teams will win the pick.
The NHL said that the Draft itself will take place after the Stanley Cup is awarded.
The NHL said it nixed the idea of a Draft in June because it gave the most weight to teams who said it would limit their ability to “use the draft as a jumping-off place for performing a roster reset” because it limited their “trade market associated with active players.”
> What about those seven teams whose seasons are finished?
The lights have been turned out on the 2019-20 season for Ottawa, Detroit, Los Angeles, Anaheim, San Jose, New Jersey and Buffalo. It’s the first time all three California teams have been shut out of the playoffs since 1996.
In Buffalo, a ninth straight season outside of the playoffs might mean that the Sabres potentially go nine months without playing, since Bettman confirmed that next season may not begin until January.
For GM Jason Botterill, whom owner Kim Pegula confirmed on Tuesday is returning for a fourth season, and the other six GMs, that might present a stiff challenge.
There will be the excitement of the Draft Lottery, then perhaps a long lull until next season.
Daly said that the NHL might develop a different type of off-season plan for those seven teams – whether it’s allowing them to open training camp earlier than the 24 teams that have played, or even potentially playing exhibition games among themselves.
“We’re dealing with a lot of issues now, but we’re going to be sensitive to issues like the [long off-season] competitively,” Daly said. “There may very well be different off-season rules because we’ve never been in this type of situation before – and unique situations sometimes necessitate unique measures. We’ll see how to approach that.”
> What does that mean for the 2019-20 regular season and statistics?
The 2019-20 regular season has been completed for all record-keeping purposes. That means that the Boston Bruins have captured the Presidents’ Trophy with 100 points; Alex Ovechkin and David Pastrnak will share the Rocket Richard Trophy with 48 goals; and Leon Draisaitl will be the league’s scoring champion and Art Ross winner with 110 points.
Ovechkin was robbed of the chance of a ninth career 50-goal season, but this is his ninth Rocket Richard. This is the first time the Richard Trophy will be shared since 2009-10, when Sidney Crosby and Steven Stamkos split it.
It has not yet been determined how the round-robin or play-in round stats will be kept. The NHL made it clear on Tuesday that those games will not count as playoff games.
> When will the 2020-21 season begin?
Bettman reiterated that the NHL is planning for a 2020-21 season that is “full in all ways,” one that includes 82 games and fans in arenas.
“Our hope and expectation is we’re going to be doing it from the start, which will be later with people in the building,” Bettman said. “There is no magic to starting in October.”
Bettman even hinted that the NHL could start next season with the Winter Classic, played on New Year’s Day, if necessary.
> Does that mean the unique 2020-21 season could begin a new way of life for the NHL schedule as we currently know it?
Bettman did not rule that out.
“That experience may give us some more information and data points to make decisions going forward,” Bettman said. “There have been a number of our colleagues who have over the years suggested we should start in October. What we’re learning through this time, which is not quite normal, is that there may be some flexibility in terms of the timing with which we schedule the season. We’re about to learn.”
> What has been the financial toll of COVID-19 on the NHL?
Bettman admitted that the pandemic has had a “severe” impact on business. By returning to play, sources indicate the NHL and NHLPA have the potential to recoup approximately $400 to $450 million in gross revenue out of a possible $1.15 billion loss.
“There has been no revenue coming in and expenses are still there,” Bettman said.
Bettman conceded that NHL owners are “probably not as wealthy as they were 12 weeks ago,” but vowed hockey “will come back as strong, if not stronger.”
> How will COVID-19 testing work for players?
Daly said the NHL’s testing will ramp up considerably as the league moves from players skating in small groups to training camp to players arriving in their hub city.
To start, players will be tested at least twice per week when returning to team facilities. When competing, players will be tested daily. Daly said players will be tested “each evening,” with notification of a positive result “before they leave their hotel room in the morning.”
> Will a player testing positive for COVID-19 derail the NHL’s tournament?
No, according to the NHL.
“One single positive test, depending on the test, should not necessarily shut the whole operation down,” Daly said. “We can’t be in a situation where we have an outbreak, that will affect our ability to continue playing.
“But a single positive test – or isolated positive tests throughout a two-month tournament – should not necessarily mean an end to the tournament.”
Bettman said that the NHL will require 25,000 to 30,000 tests to return to play. He reiterated that those tests cannot come at the expense of public supply, but does not believe that will be an issue.
“Our medical advisers and independent medical advisers tell us that by the time we’re doing this over the summer, that will be a relatively insignificant number of tests relative to the number of tests that will be [publicly] available.”
Bettman estimated the cost of testing alone at “millions of dollars” and the total cost to return to play in “tens of millions of dollars.”
> What might a playoff schedule look like?
Expect a March Madness-style of schedule, at least in the first few weeks of the NHL’s return to play, with games at all hours of the afternoon and late into the night.
“I think the fact that with no travel associated at all that we can safely schedule some back-to-back [games],” Daly said. “We’re not going to overload these playoffs with back-to-backs, but I think it’s certainly reasonable in the first several rounds of the playoffs, maybe even in the conference finals.”
Daly said one of the objectives from the NHLPA was to “make it as quick as possible” for the players who may be isolated from their families. If the players are willing to play the first two rounds in a best-of-five format instead of the traditional best-of-seven, Daly said it would shave more than a week off the schedule.
Daly said: “We felt from an overall health perspective, the sooner we can go in and get out, the better.”
Like so many facets of the NHL’s return to play format, that, too, remains up in the air.
Contact Frank Seravalli on Twitter: @frank_seravalli
LAS VEGAS (AP) — Mountain West Conference Commissioner Gloria Nevarez said Thursday the forfeitures that volleyball teams are willing to take to avoid playing San Jose State is “not what we celebrate in college athletics” and that she is heartbroken over what has transpired this season surrounding the Spartans and their opponents.
Four teams have canceled games against San Jose State: Boise State, Southern Utah, Utah State and Wyoming, with none of the schools explicitly saying why they were forfeiting.
A group of Nevada players issued a statement saying they will not take the floor when the Wolf Pack are scheduled to host the Spartans on Oct. 26. They cited their “right to safety and fair competition,” though their school reaffirmed Thursday that the match is still planned and that state law bars forfeiture “for reasons related to gender identity or expression.”
All those schools, except Southern Utah, are in the Mountain West. New Mexico, also in the MWC, went ahead with its home match on Thursday night, which was won by the Spartans, 3-1, the team’s first victory since Sept. 24.
“It breaks my heart because they’re human beings, young people, student-athletes on both sides of this issue that are getting a lot of national negative attention,” Nevarez said in an interview with The Associated Press at Mountain West basketball media days. “It just doesn’t feel right to me.”
Republican governors of Idaho, Nevada, Utah and Wyoming have made public statements in support of the cancellations, citing a need for fairness in women’s sports. Former President Donald Trump, the GOP nominee in this year’s presidential race, this week referenced an unidentified volleyball match when he was asked during a Fox News town hall about transgender athletes in women’s sports.
“I saw the slam, it was a slam. I never saw a ball hit so hard, hit the girl in the head,” Trump replied before he was asked what can be done. “You just ban it. The president bans it. You just don’t let it happen.”
After Trump’s comment, San Diego State issued a statement that said “it has been incorrectly reported that an San Diego State University student-athlete was hit in the face with a volleyball during match play with San Jose State University. The ball bounced off the shoulder of the student-athlete, and the athlete was uninjured and did not miss a play.”
San Jose State has not made any direct comments about the politicians’ “fairness” references, and Nevarez did not go into details.
“I’m learning a lot about the issue,” Nevarez said. “I don’t know a lot of the language yet or the science or the understanding nationally of how this issue plays out. The external influences are so far on either side. We have an election year. It’s political, so, yeah, it feels like a no-win based on all the external pressure.”
The cancellations could mean some teams will not qualify for the conference tournament Nov. 27-30 in Las Vegas, where the top six schools are slated to compete for the league championship.
“The student-athlete (in question) meets the eligibility standard, so if a team does not play them, it’s a forfeit, meaning they take a loss,” Nevarez said.
Ahead of the Oct. 26 match in Reno. Nevada released a statement acknowledging that “a majority of the Wolf Pack women’s volleyball team” had decided to forfeit against San Jose State. The school said only the university can take that step but any player who decides not to play would face no punishment.
OTTAWA – Travis Green might not have liked the end result, but he’s counting on his team learning from the effort.
Green’s Ottawa Senators were handed a 3-1 loss by the New Jersey Devils Thursday night in a game that highlighted the importance of sticking with things.
“I thought both teams played pretty well,” said Green. “I thought we had a lot of the game that I liked, but I thought there’s a few moments where it got away. We got away from our game, and they stuck with their game a little longer.
“There’s always momentum back and forth for one team to create some chances. It’s a fine line between winning and losing in the league, especially when you’re playing, two good teams are playing.”
Jacob Markstrom’s 30 saves also played a part, with the Devils goaltender only getting beat with 65 seconds left in regulation as the Senators were on the power play with an empty net.
Brady Tkachuk tipped a Claude Giroux shot to spoil Markstrom’s shutout bid.
“Outstanding,” said Devils coach Sheldon Keefe of his goaltender. “Just terrible that he doesn’t get the shutout that he deserves in this one here.
“You feel for him when they make that (penalty) call. You can just kind of feel like it’s going to give them a little extra life. But he was outstanding for us, no question.”
The two teams were scoreless after the first period, where each had to fight for every opportunity. Noah Gregor rang a shot off the crossbar for the Senators, but otherwise, neither team was able to generate much offensively.
The Devils capitalized in the second as a power play expired with Erik Haula redirecting a Johnathan Kovacevic shot past Anton Forsberg, who made 32 saves.
Less than four minutes later, Nathan Bastian took advantage of a Giroux giveaway and beat Forsberg low blocker for his first of the season with the Devils short-handed.
“I liked our second period a lot,” Keefe said. “We took hold of the game and didn’t give up much, and when we did, I thought it was really from the perimeter, only a couple there.”
The Devils tightened up defensively in the third and were able to make it 3-0 when Paul Cotter was left alone in the slot.
“I think for stretches of the game we played the right way and kind of get in on the forecheck and play that way,” said Senators centre Nick Cousins. “It seems like when we get down a couple goals, we kind of change our game, which isn’t a recipe for success in this league.
“I think we’ve just got to keep doing the right things over and over again, even when it’s 2-0.”
With the Senators just four games in and still learning and adjusting to a new system, Green understands there will be growing pains along the way.
“We’re also trying to define our game,” he said. “I think we’re getting there. Both teams play fast. It was a fast skating game. There wasn’t a lot of room to move out there for either team.”
In his short tenure behind the Senators bench, Green has seen his team play very different styles of games and knows there will be nights like this along the way, but learning from them will be key.
“There’s going to be a lot of nights where you kind of got to earn everything you get,” admitted Green. “It’s not going to be freewheeling. Good teams don’t play freewheeling hockey.
“You learn when you win, you learn when you lose games that you don’t play well. You learn when you lose games that you had a pretty good game but you still lose and you’ve got to find a way. Good teams find a way to win those games.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 17, 2024.
MONTREAL – The Montreal Canadiens fell 4-1 to the Los Angeles Kings on Thursday. They also lost their top minute-muncher in the process.
Matheson logged 7:35 in ice time during the first period but did not return for the second because of an upper-body injury. When or how Matheson sustained the injury was not clear. The Canadiens said he would be re-evaluated on Friday.
The game was tied at 1 before he exited, forcing the Canadiens to play with five defencemen for 40 minutes.
“Mike is one of the biggest parts of our D core, and I think losing him — he’s playing against top line, playing power play and we want him on the ice — definitely losing him was a big loss,” teammate David Savard said. “We got to figure out a way to get the two points, even if a player goes out.”
The 30-year-old Matheson of Pointe-Claire, Que., led all Canadiens defencemen with 62 points and a 25:33 average ice time last season.
With his absence, rookie sensation Lane Hutson played a whopping 30:05 in only his seventh NHL game. The next closest player? Kaiden Guhle at 23:09.
Head coach Martin St. Louis was impressed with how the 20-year-old Hutson handled the challenge.
“Lane doesn’t take a shift off,” head coach Martin St. Louis said. “I love the consistency of his compete level, and he drives possession. For a guy who played 30 minutes, I think he gave everything he could to try and help the team.
“I’m not surprised. I know it’s challenging at this level, losing Mike definitely made him play many minutes, chasing the game made him play many minutes, but I just love his compete level.”
Canadiens fans have been clamouring for Hutson — a five-foot-nine, 162-pound defenceman with world-class skill — to take Matheson’s spot on the No. 1 power play.
The Canadiens, however, went 0-for-3 with Hutson running the show after Matheson went down. In the first instance, Kirby Dach took a hooking penalty early in the man-advantage to end it. On the second, the Canadiens failed to generate any zone time.
The third came in the final minutes, but the Kings buried an empty-netter.
“It wasn’t a lack of opportunity, lots of ice time, lots of shifts,” Hutson said. “It was good, it was fun, but obviously you want to be on the other side of it, winning.
“Means a lot (to get that opportunity), but obviously, you want to get more out of that opportunity. It’s a lot of ice, and you want to keep taking steps in the right direction.”
‘IMMATURE EFFORT’
The Canadiens fell to a Kings team that had lost three straight games and was coming off a 6-2 loss to the Toronto Maple Leafs on Wednesday night.
Under those circumstances, the Canadiens were brutally honest with themselves after the game.
“Definitely disappointed,” captain Nick Suzuki said. “It was an immature effort from us, especially with them playing yesterday and getting in late, so I think we gave them too much life, and let them feel comfortable in the game. It’s on us to be a lot better than that.”
Before the game, St. Louis stressed the need for a good first period against a fatigued Los Angeles side. That’s not what he saw Thursday night.
“I think we had 14 turnovers in the first period. It’s unacceptable. It gives them life,” he said. “Then you’re chasing the game for the second half of it — we didn’t play to our standard.
“I’m really disappointed. Really disappointed.”
BIG SAVE DAVE
Kings goalie David Rittich played his second game in two nights — an unusual occurrence in this day and age of the NHL. He made 25 saves after allowing four goals on 14 shots in Toronto.
“We always believe in him anyway, but he performed today pretty well and bounced back,” defenceman Vladislav Gavrikov said. “It’s probably like most important for himself, that’s huge, and for the team. He played outstanding today.”
LONG ROAD
The Kings are opening the season on a seven-game road trip because of renovations at Crypto.com Arena. They’ve collected six of a possible 10 points so far.
“Pretty much worse (than expected),” forward Phillip Danault said. “We’ve been on the road for three weeks … It’s good team-bonding, whether we should do it again I’m not sure, but it has turned out well let’s say with six points out of 10.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 17, 2024.
