The National Hockey League and the National Hockey League Players Association reached an agreement on Sunday to begin the new season on January 13.
The deal is for a 56 game schedule, division realignments (including an all-Canadian division), with the regular season ending on May 8th and the playoffs ending with a Stanley Cup Champion in mid-July. The league is planning for a normal 2021-22 season with training camps to start next September. Each team will only play opponents within their divisions. At the end of the regular season, the top four teams in each division make the playoffs and will play a best of seven intradivisional matchup in the first round (1 vs. 4, 2 vs. 3). The new divisions just implemented for only this season are as follows: North- Montreal, Toronto, Calgary, Edmonton, Ottawa, Vancouver, and Winnipeg/East- Boston, Buffalo, New Jersey, NY Islanders, NY Rangers, Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, Washington/Central- Chicago, Carolina, Columbus, Dallas, Detroit, Florida, Nashville, Tampa Bay/West- Anaheim, Arizona, Colorado, Los Angeles, Minnesota, St. Louis, San Jose, and Vegas.
