With almost the hockey world shuttered for the foreseeable future, a big chunk of the top stories of the week revolved around cancellations and postponements.
KHL Shuts Down: One league that was hoping to quickly resume their postseason was the KHL. Even in the aftermath of two teams withdrawing from the second round of the playoffs, the original plan was to take a week off to make changes to the six-team field and then get back underway. Instead, they’ve changed their mind and cancelled the remainder of the playoffs while announcing they won’t aware the Gagarin Cup. Now, their focus shifts to starting next season on time which is a different approach to the NHL who has basically acknowledged that the start of 2020-21 will be delayed if play resumes in the coming weeks and months.
Two Colorado Players Test Positive: Until this week, the only team with a known positive test for COVID-19 was Ottawa. That changed when Colorado announced that an unnamed player had tested positive but had since recovered. They then revealed over the weekend that a second unnamed player has tested positive and is in self-isolation. That brings the number of confirmed positive tests of NHL players to four.
CHL Cancellations: Although the CHL had cancelled their regular seasons already (with leagues having different plans regarding how to handle the variance in games played), their hope was to get the playoffs underway at a later date. That’s no longer the case as the league has cancelled the postseason as well as the annual Memorial Cup, a tournament involving the winners of each league plus the host team. It will be the first time in the 101-year history of the Memorial Cup that it won’t be awarded. There was one other notable development from junior hockey during the week as the WHL granted 14-year-old forward Connor Bedard exceptional player status, allowing him to enter the league next season, one year earlier than he normally would have been able to. It’s the first time in WHL history that they’ve given someone this designation. Bedard will be eligible for the 2023 NHL Entry Draft.
Zegras Turns Pro: After Kings prospect Alex Turcotte decided to forego the final three years of his college eligibility, Ducks prospect Trevor Zegras, another top-ten pick from last June, did the same. The center had a strong freshman campaign at Boston University, picking up 36 points in 33 games while also leading the World Juniors in assists with nine in five games for Team USA. Zegras will try to push for a spot on Anaheim’s roster next season but may need some time at the minor league level as well.
More Postponements: With there being no immediate end in sight to the pandemic, the NHL unsurprisingly has started to postpone some of their upcoming events. The Draft Lottery was slated to be held early next month at the conclusion of the regular season but with their plan being to resume the season later on, that being delayed was inevitable. The same could be said for the NHL Awards as those are dependent on the regular season which may not finish for a while and they too were postponed. Not surprisingly, the draft has also been put on hold with the results of the regular season and playoffs shaping the order of selection so obviously, the draft can’t be held until everything is finished. There’s a good chance that the event will be a slimmed-down version whenever it is held.
Just admit the regular season is done and announce the playoffs as standings sit. There is no way the NHL plays in July and August.
July and August might be the only months that the NHL plays in any time soon.
They probably don’t want to make an official cancellation without an official start to the playoffs. Want to present it as “we have bad news, but also good news!”
In the unlikely scenario that the NHL does complete the season, it will start extremely late. The playoffs should start at the resumption of play and consist of the top 2 teams in each division only. The first 2 rounds would play 5 game series and only the finals having a 7 game series. That way the players get some kind of break before the start of the 20/21 season. It’s not perfect but would be a way of completing the season. For those teams that don’t make the playoffs, it could be an incentive to work hard to be at the top of the league all season.
with some teams having 11-14 or so games remaining should play division teams with games they have within division and shorten season to 74 games , so with points determining standings and seedings of top 3 in each Division and top 2 wild cards in each conference, best of 5 in first two rounds best of seven in conference finals and Stanley Cup series , provided they continue season and have enough time for Draft and Free Agency , and each team take a break before training camps open in possibly short exhibition season say 3-4 games then start 20-21 season.
They could go backwards to say, everyone’s 68th or 69th game and go with those points for the final standings placement. Not perfect but a possibility