http://espn.go.com/nhl/story/_/id/7321214/nhl-approves-radical-four-conference-alignment-plan

Conference "A"
Anaheim
Calgary
Colorado
Edmonton
Los Angeles
Phoenix
San Jose
Vancouver


Conference "B"
Chicago
Columbus
Dallas
Detroit
Minnesota
Nashville
St. Louis
Winnipeg

Conference "C"
Boston
Buffalo
Florida
Montreal
Ottawa
Tampa Bay
Toronto

Conference "D"
Carolina
New Jersey
New York Islanders
New York Rangers
Philadelphia
Pittsburgh
Washington

Interesting.

IDK what the fuck's going on w/ Conference C & D. Looks like they're trying to break up the south. Will this draw more fans if the Lightning play the Leafs more?

I like it

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I like the playoff format, play within conference for the first two rounds then the conference champs play each other then the winners play the for the cup.
Bring back the Norris!

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I don't see why not:

Conference A: Smythe
Conference B: Norris
Conference C: Adams
Conference D: Patrick

Let's do it old school

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Not sure I care one way or another about this. I assume the playoff format stays pretty much the same.

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Wow... I foresee a lot more crappy Blackhawks games in the future... that kind of sucks...

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team Mully & Hanley
team Meatpants

Are they assuming that the Florida franchises are moving to Hartford & Quebec? Then that'd make sense.

I don't know about the Lightning, but the Panthers rely very heavily on the Canadiens and Sabres to sell tickets. Really, the Panthers depend on every fucking transplant from anywhere east of Minneapolis to sell tickets, but Habs and Sabres fans mount full-scale invasions.

Notice that both eastern divisions have only seven teams while both western divisions have eight, and neither the Red Wings nor the Blue Jackets had their pleas for Eastern Conference play heard. This clearly means they're budgeting for the Coyotes to move to QC.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5sQPZ9dD9v8

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I heard last night that there were 4 teams against this... hmmm let us look at which 4 teams could possibly have been against this:

Conference "D"
Carolina
New Jersey
New York Islanders
New York Rangers
Philadelphia
Pittsburgh
Washington

Well there's 2 right out of the box...

And if I had to guess, I'd also say Edmonton and Colorado... yeah, that feels right.

5 teams fighting for 2 spots means you're not going to be seeing any changes to the points distribution system...

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team Mully & Hanley
team Meatpants

Clearly sets up the NHL expanding with two more Canadian teams in C and D. A second Toronto and Quebec I'd bet.

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Team Cutler.

Rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic...

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The Isles love keeping their travel costs down with three road games against New York, New Jersey, and Philadelphia. Philly is a day trip and the other six are virtual home games.

Toronto was against the realignment, by the way.

There is not going to be an expansion. There aren't two more places capable of supporting the NHL in addition to the 30 that already are, because there are not 30 places capably supporting the NHL right now. The only move that's on the table is Phoenix or Columbus--->Quebec City. No one wants to own an NHL team in Kansas City. There's nowhere to put an NHL team in Seattle and doesn't project to be one any time soon. League policy is that the Leafs can squat on everything from London to Kingston, so there's never going to be a Hamilton/Markham/Cambridge/Waterloo/wherever-the-fuck-outside-Toronto team.

Let's sort out the problems with the Coyotes, Blue Jackets, Blues, Islanders, Predators, and Panthers before we start adding more teams to this shitshow of a sports league.

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Sorry, I should have clarified a few things... I meant voted against, I'm sure there were more than 4 teams against this. Talking heads on Versus said last night that Toronto was against it but still voted for it... because that makes sense...

I wrongly assumed that the Islanders cared about winning more-so than traveling costs As sad as that statement is, you're probably right...

And for the record, this is pretty great for the immediate future of the Blackhawks. The current state of NHL teams makes Conference "B" the weakest, and it's not even close. It's gonna be like the NFC west of the NHL where better east coast teams will be left out while the Saint Louis Blams make the playoffs with a .500 record.

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team Mully & Hanley
team Meatpants

There's no alignment in which the Islanders are a winning team, unless it's a division consisting solely of the Islanders.

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team Mully & Hanley
team Meatpants