Everyone is talking about the era of the super-conferences in college football, but it has now officially happened in hockey first.
The Atlanta Thrashers becoming the Winnipeg Jets 2.0 prompted the NHL to make some realignment changes. And instead of just tweaking the Southeast Division, cuz you can’t have Winnipeg, especially with their lovely nighttime midseason temperatures in the Southeast, Gary Bettman wen complete overhaul.
Here’s what we had in our plan back in May
The Board of Governors have authorized the proposal; it will go live pending input from the NHLPA. It could take effect next season. You can click the picture above for a closer look at the NHL franchise map.
The new realignment plan attempts to address: travel issues/concerns, preserving rivalries, and having the game’s biggest stars play in every city at least once every season.
From the AP:
The new look has two conferences with seven teams all based in the Eastern time zone: New Jersey, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, New York Rangers, New York Islanders, Washington and Carolina in one, and Boston, Montreal, Toronto, Ottawa, Buffalo, Florida and Tampa Bay in the other.
The third conference consists of eight teams in the Eastern and Central time zones: Detroit Red Wings, Columbus Blue Jackets, Nashville Predators, St. Louis Blues, Chicago Blackhawks, Minnesota Wild, Dallas and Winnipeg.
The fourth conference has eight teams in the Mountain and Pacific time zones: Los Angeles, Anaheim, Phoenix, San Jose, Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton and Colorado.
The conferences have not been named.
Will they go back to the Prince of Wales and Campbell Conferences? With the Norris and Adams Divisions? There were two more I’m just not old enough to remember them. Will be interesting to see what they go with this year.
Paul M. Banks is CEO of The Sports Bank.net, an official Google News site generating millions of unique visitors. He’s also a regular contributor to Chicago Now, Walter Football.com, Yardbarker, and Fox Sports
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