The NHL is an ever-changing league. It needs to be in order to keep evolving along with the sport of hockey. However, they are considering going back to an old setup the league briefly experimented with.
The National Hockey League is considering expanding its regular season schedule, according to ESPN. This change would see the current 82-game schedule grow to an 84-game schedule.
The NHL briefly used an 84-game schedule from 1992 to 1994. The league and NHLPA agreed to add two “neutral site” games to each team’s schedule during that time.
The driving force behind this potential change is a schedule imbalance. Teams have complained that they only get to play their intra-division rivals only three times out of the year. This is the same number of games they play against non-division, intra-conference opponents.
Adding two extra games allows the NHL to keep its current format where every team in the league plays each other at least once. This also allows divisional rival teams to have four games against each other over the course of the season.
The league may be incentivized to do this seeing as divisional rival showdowns garner higher attendance and national TV ratings. “They could play Calgary in Edmonton 10 times and sell them all out. It’s crazy,” one NHL general manager put it.
To compensate for the extra regular season games, the working theory is that they would come out of the league’s preseason schedule. It did not receive discussion during the board of governors meetings recently. However, it’s likely to be brought up in March during the general manager’s meetings.
The NHL already has major business on its plate, as they navigate the sale of the Ottawa Senators. It looks like major changes are coming to the world’s biggest hockey league, and those changes are coming soon.
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