The National Hockey League has a big decision on its hands when the newest expansion team begins play in 2021. Currently, it appears that the plan is to have the Seattle Kraken join the Pacific Division and have the Arizona Coyotes slide over from the Pacific to the Central Division to balance the league out at four divisions of eight teams each.
Additionally, there are calls to reform the playoff structure. As it currently sits, the top three teams in each division make the playoffs, and then there are two “wild cards” that can come from any team within the respective conference that houses those divisions. For example, this year in the Western Conference, five teams made the playoffs from the Central Division versus three from the Pacific. A similar scenario may play out in the Eastern Conference if Columbus can secure the final playoff spot.
But the addition of the Kraken presents the league with an opportunity to restructure the divisions and potentially revamp the playoff approach. I am going to present to you a plan for such a change.
Let us begin with looking at the divisional structure and re-balancing things. The proposal I have for restructuring the divisions is going to look familiar if you are fan of American football. 32 teams. 16 per conference. Four divisions with four teams each.
Since there are some natural geographic pods, let us array the teams that way:
WESTERN CONFERENCE
Northwest Division:
Calgary Flames
Edmonton Oilers
Vancouver Canucks
Seattle Kraken
Pacific Division:
Anaheim Ducks
Los Angeles Kings
San Jose Sharks
Vegas Golden Knights
Southwest Division:
Arizona Coyotes
Colorado Avalanche
Dallas Stars
Nashville Predators
North Central Division:
Chicago Blackhawks
Minnesota Wild
St. Louis Blues
Winnipeg Jets
EASTERN CONFERENCE
Southeast Division:
Carolina Hurricanes
Florida Panthers
Tampa Bay Lightning
Washington Capitals
Erie Division:
Buffalo Sabres
Columbus Blue Jackets
Detroit Red Wings
Pittsburgh Penguins
Niagara Division:
Boston Bruins
Montreal Canadiens
Ottawa Senators
Toronto Maple Leafs
Atlantic Division:
New Jersey Devils
New York Islanders
New York Rangers
Philadelphia Flyers
Yes, yes, I know. More name changes for division. Nobody really likes that. And the geographic compression really works better for the Eastern Conference teams, especially in the Erie and Atlantic Divisions. But even out west, the travel is not that bad.
And that becomes key, because with the realignment of the teams, it would require a change in scheduling philosophy.
Currently, teams play 32 games against the other conference and 50 games within their own. My proposal would keep that same scheduling approach, but flip up the balance of the games.
I will use the Vegas Golden Knights (my local team) as an example moving forward.
During the 2018-19 season (the last full regular season because of COVID), VGK played 50 games against the Western Conference. The games were split so that they played 21 games against the Central Division and 29 games against the Pacific, which is their home division.
Under my realignment plan, VGK would still play 50 games against the Western Conference. But the array would be different. VGK would play 26 games against the rest of the Western Conference (Northwest, Southwest, North Central) and 24 games against the teams in their own division. It would mean playing each team in the division eight times (four home games, four away games). This structure would obviously hold for each team across the league. The reason for this would be for playoff seeding. Under the plan I am proposing, the top two teams in each division would make the playoffs. So having more games in your own division would ensure that a clear top two teams would emerge.
There is a scheduling quirk that needs to be addressed, and that comes in the non-divisional conference schedule. 26 games does not divide evenly by 12 teams, so there would be one repeated matchup in conference that would need to be scheduled. This could be done either randomly, or by record, although random assignment might be the best option.
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