NHL, NHLPA take small step toward return to games

The NHL and NHLPA took a small step toward concluding the 2019-20 season, which has been on hold since March 12 because of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.

On Friday, the NHLPA agreed to further negotiations with the NHL on a plan that will allow 24 teams into a playoff.

The NHLPA issued a statement Friday:

“The Executive Board of the National Hockey League Players’ Association has authorized further negotiations with the NHL on a 24-team return to play format to determine the winner of the 2020 Stanley Cup. Several details remain to be negotiated and an agreement on the format would still be subject to the parties reaching agreement on all issues relevant to resuming play.​”

Unless further negotiations lead to changes, the format is expected to see the top four teams in each conference (based on points percentages at the time of the NHL halted its regular season) to get a bye into the first round. Those four teams would play a mini-tournament to determine seedings.

The following eight teams in each conference would stage a “play-in” round and be seeded based on their point percentages within their respective conferences at the time of the NHL’s hiatus.

Under this format, the fifth-seeded Pittsburgh Penguins would face the No. 12 Montreal Canadiens in a best-of-five series.

One of the formats under consideration called for the play-in round to be a best-of-three series. According to Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman, NHLPA members expressed concern that potentially facing All-Star goaltender Carey Price in only three games would be unfair to any team that would have drawn the Canadiens.

Friedman reported Penguins defenseman Kris Letang, who serves as the team’s representative to the players’ association, voted in favor of the best-of-five format which has them potentially facing the Canadiens.

“At the end of the day, the playoffs are a different beast,” Letang said. “No matter (who) you play, it’s going to be hard. (If it wasn’t Montreal), it was going to be Washington, or Philadelphia, or a challenge like that.”

Before the hiatus, the Canadiens were well out of the playoff picture. In advance of February’s trade deadline, they operated as sellers and dealt away All-Star forward Ilya Kovalchuk for a draft pick.

Under this agreement, they will get a chance to compete for the Stanley Cup, starting with the Penguins, who were 2-1-0 against the Canadiens this season.

Even with this vote, a potential return to action is still weeks, if not months, away from happening.

There are several factors well out of the NHL’s or NHLPA’s control, mostly tied to governments at the local, state, provincial and national levels within the United States and Canada.

Most prominent is the closure of the border between the United States and Canada to “nonessential” travel until at least June 21. That designation includes “tourism, recreation and entertainment.” On Tuesday, NHL commissioner Bill Daly told TSN’s Frank Seravalli he was “hopeful” that closure would not impact the league’s return to play.

A handful of the Penguins’ Canadian-native players who went to homes north of the border, including goaltenders Tristan Jarry and Matt Murray.

European players who returned to their residences on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean presumably would need a 14-day self-quarantine upon reentry into either the United States or Canada.

Assuming all willing players are able to enter either the United States or Canada, it would become a matter of the local or state/provincial jurisdictions allowing gatherings large enough for a three-week training camp, which the NHLPA has requested.

Finding a way to do that in a fair, universal fashion will be a considerable undertaking. For example, rules might be relaxed earlier in Cranberry, where the Penguins’ workout facility is located, compared to Vorhees Township, N.J., site of the Philadelphia Flyers’ facility.

Another matter which still needs to be settled is where games will be staged. The NHL has been considering eight or nine “hub” cities to stage a tournament. Regions with relatively low infection rates as well as ample lodging options would be highly considered. So a locale such as Las Vegas would clearly be considered while the New York metro area, even with four NHL-caliber rinks, won’t see live hockey anytime soon given how the coronavirus has ravaged that populace.

Columbus, Ohio is seen as a potential location to stage games. Ohio has a fairly low infection rate at 263 confirmed infections per 100,000 residents as of Thursday according to The New York Times. Additionally, downtown Columbus has several high-end hotels – a virtual requirement for professional sports teams – in the immediate vicinity of Nationwide Arena, which also has a practice rink on the premises.

All of that means a potential marquee series between Sidney Crosby’s Penguins and Price’s Montreal Canadiens could be played out in front of a mostly empty building — team staffers and arena employees will be allowed on site — three hours to the west of downtown Pittsburgh.

If play resumes, a major issue will be regular testing for players. In the event of a positive test, will that mean a quarantine for teammates or opponents of that individual player, coach or staffer who is infected?

Beyond that, what kind of rules will be in place with regards to person-to-person contact? MLB, where contact is somewhat minimal, has proposed several rules that would outlaw seemingly mundane activities such as fist bumps or spitting.

Hockey, with hugs to celebrate goals, scrums, fights, goalmouth scrambles and disgusting facewashes, involves substantially more contact, to put it mildly.

The NHL and NHLPA took the first step towards getting back on the ice Friday. Now, they need to walk a few more miles to make that a reality.