Caught on repeat: NHL’s playoff format retains delivering déjà vu matchups | NHL

“It’s the stupidest factor ever.” This was Washington Capitals’ ahead Daniel Winnik’s evaluate in 2017 of the NHL’s nonetheless (considerably) new playoff format. Three seasons earlier, together with realigning its divisions, the NHL had deserted it’s earlier, easy playoff association. For 20 years, the highest eight groups from every convention certified for the playoffs, with the first-placed workforce enjoying the eighth-placed workforce, the second-placed workforce performed the seventh, and so forth. “I don’t know why it’s not one to eight,” Winnik mentioned. “I don’t know why we acquired away from that.” Lots of people are nonetheless asking the identical query.

On Sunday, because the NHL locked in its first Western convention playoff matchup, confirming that the Dallas Stars will face the Colorado Avalanche, some followers took to on-line boards to each have a good time and lament. “Anyone else hate the divisional format? I really suppose each of those groups are legit contenders,” one person posted to the r/hockey subreddit below a hyperlink asserting the matchup. “Fairly positive actually everybody does,” one other responded. Certainly, it appears unfair that one of many high groups within the West will likely be eradicated so quickly into the postseason. Worse, is that, thanks partly to the playoff format, followers have seen this matchup coming for ages – a predictability that’s supposed to construct anticipation, however has as an alternative turn into annoying.

Right here’s how the NHL playoffs work now: Since 2014, the highest three groups from every NHL division qualify for the postseason, plus the following two highest-placed groups by factors, no matter their division, as wildcard entrants. Within the first spherical, every of the highest divisional seeds performs a wildcard workforce, with the workforce with probably the most factors enjoying the wildcard workforce with the least. In the meantime, the second- and third-placed groups from every division face off.

When it was introduced for the 2014 season, the revamped playoff rearrangement was only one piece of a broader league-wide realignment. The NHL redesigned its divisions and conferences to align extra intently with time zone boundaries to each scale back journey and make TV schedules higher for followers. “We performed a majority of video games outdoors the Jap time zone, and our subsequent era of followers needed to have the ability to watch and hear. However so lots of our video games began too late,” John Davidson, president of the Columbus Blue Jackets – who moved from the Jap Convention to the Western Convention in the course of the realignment – mentioned when the modifications had been accredited.

NHL commissioner Gary Bettman additionally felt the realignment would create extra intense rivalries, as a result of it meant that groups started to play inside their division and convention extra steadily – three or 4 instances every – with the rest of the video games towards groups from the opposite convention. On the eve of the 2014 Stanley Cup remaining, Bettman declared the trouble a mission achieved. “I feel the complete realignment this season has been obtained overwhelmingly in a optimistic manner,” Bettman mentioned at a 2014 press convention. “The rivalries have been nice,” he mentioned, talking of that 12 months’s postseason – the primary below the brand new format.

Whether or not or not divisional or convention rivalries have intensified for the reason that realignment is a degree of debate. What’s clearer is that the playoff matchups in an ever-expanding league stay in some instances painfully predictable.

The LA Kings of latest years are a very good instance. This postseason would be the fourth 12 months in a row that LA will face the Edmonton Oilers within the first spherical of the playoffs. The Oilers have received the previous three conferences. Overlook rivalry, that is extra like a recurring nightmare for Kings followers – and one they may see coming for months. It’s an analogous, although much less pronounced, problem for the Toronto Maple Leafs, who’ve confronted the Boston Bruins thrice within the first spherical since 2018 and the Tampa Bay Lightning twice. “You see LA-Edmonton yearly within the first spherical. Is that basically good for the league?” Winnipeg ahead Gabriel Vilardi requested reporters in March. “You may’t make rivalries. They simply occur naturally. That’s my opinion.”

What to do? The answer to all this may not be a contemporary overhaul of the playoff format itself, however of the regular-season factors system. Some have urged that the NHL ought to undertake the 3-2-1 factors system it used within the 4 Nations match earlier this 12 months – that’s, three factors for a win, two for an time beyond regulation win or shootout win, and one for an time beyond regulation or shootout loss (zero for a loss in regulation). Presently, the NHL awards two factors for any win and one level for a loss in time beyond regulation or a shootout. The idea is that the 3-2-1 system would incentivize groups to win extra video games in regulation, thereby shifting the general standings, and rewarding groups which may have in any other case not made the postseason. One ballot in 2024 confirmed 78.7% of NHL followers need the change. But, if the 3-2-1 factors system had been utilized this season, the Oilers and Kings nonetheless would have probably performed each other within the first spherical. And the Leafs wouldn’t have performed the Senators (as they may), however as an alternative, uh, the Lightning.

For now, Bettman doesn’t suppose the format wants a rethink. “I’m fairly dug in on this,” he mentioned in March. “I like precisely what we’ve and should you have a look at the races that we’re having for the common season, playoffs have began already,” Bettman added, referring to the truth that some groups have been comparatively sure of the workforce they’ll face within the first spherical for a lot of weeks. Bettman referred to this inevitability because the NHL’s “play-in match”, referring to the NBA’s additional video games that decide the ultimate groups to make the postseason. However, even by his personal account, Bettman ought to think about a change. When the present playoff format was launched, Bettman mentioned it will stand for no less than three years “barring one other relocation or growth” – neither of which, he famous, had been being thought of. Since then, the NHL has seen one workforce relocate and two new be part of. It may be time.

Playoff predictions

Western Convention remaining Las Vegas v Winnipeg

Jap Convention remaining Toronto v Washington

Stanley Cup remaining Winnipeg v Toronto

If this proves to be the matchup, it will be becoming for a 12 months by which Canada has (re)outlined itself a lot through hockey {that a} Canadian workforce lastly ends the nation’s 35-year Cup drought. Issues have aligned properly for the Leafs this season, however the hockey gods are additionally endlessly merciless, so if this unbelievable Cup Ultimate ought to happen, the secure wager can be with the Jets.