NHL Realignment Announced - not good for the Canes -- UPDATED

[tarheelhockey]

I haven't been following. Does the realignment change the playoffs as well, to be like the AHL's where you have to come out of your division in order to make the conference final? I've never liked that playoff structure. You play more games against your own division during the regular season, then you play them a bunch more in the playoffs.

I like the realignment, but didn't want to see a change to the playoff structure.

It's basically a hybrid structure where the 2 and 3 seeds in each division play each other, but the other seeds will be determined according to their conference standing.

Guaranteed to cause confusion during the stretch run every year.

 

[DaleCooper]

Comments from Kirk Muller: http://www.nhl.com/ice/news.htm?id=660138&navid=DL|NHL|home

"It's going to be tough. There are a lot of good teams in there," Carolina coach Kirk Muller said. "There are a lot of grinding, physical teams so it makes you sit back and evaluate your team and organization asking are we the type of team that's skilled enough to go into certain arenas and get points or do you want to change your style to match up with your opponents?

"We're obviously in the hunt this year, but it will be something where you may have to sit back and look at everything and ask where do you fit in with your opposition and decide if you want to make changes or if you're comfortable with the group that you have?"

 

[Blueline Bomber]

Maybe I'm missing something, but don't those divisions simply increase the problem the new divisions were supposed to fix?

No one liked Winnipeg in the SE, mostly because of the travel involved for the Jets (and the other SE teams) for their divisional matchups. Fine, I understand that.

But now you've got Florida and Tampa having to travel pretty much the same distance to play Ottawa and Montreal for their divisional matchups. And not only that, but Winnipeg STILL has to travel the same distance south to play Dallas in their new divisional matchups. Likewise for the likes of the distance between Edm/Cal to Phx/Ana

In fact, about the only thing this divisional change does is help out Carolina, Washington and Columbus, because now their travel schedule is next to nill (since I believe the new schedule is ALL divisional games, right?)

 

[DaleCooper]

I think the real problem was time zones, which this does a good job of addressing. I'm not sure the actual travel is really much of a problem (is an extra hour or two in luxury-style airline seats that big of an issue?). Time zone changes are what really mess with a person's routine and add complications for television.

 

[Finlandia WOAT]

So the playoffs, if the season ended right now:

We would play the Devils.

Boston would play Ottawa.

Vancouver would play LA.

St. Louis would play Minnesota.

Then Chicago (the number 1 team) would play the 4th wildcard spot. Anaheim the 3rd, Montreal the 2nd and Pittsburgh the 1st. It's really confusing to figure which teams hold the wildcards right now, but I think that's how it would work.

 

[geehaad]

We all know the realignment's #1 priority: getting Detroit into the Eastern Conference.

It's basically a hybrid structure where the 2 and 3 seeds in each division play each other, but the other seeds will be determined according to their conference standing.

Guaranteed to cause confusion during the stretch run every year.

Good. Another barometer to determining just how knowledgeable the guy is who's arguing with you about hockey, right?

 

[Joe McGrath]

In fact, about the only thing this divisional change does is help out Carolina, Washington and Columbus, because now their travel schedule is next to nill (since I believe the new schedule is ALL divisional games, right?)

All divisional games? Did I miss a sarcasm emoticon somewhere?

 

[Finlandia WOAT]

Maybe I'm missing something, but don't those divisions simply increase the problem the new divisions were supposed to fix?

No one liked Winnipeg in the SE, mostly because of the travel involved for the Jets (and the other SE teams) for their divisional matchups. Fine, I understand that.

But now you've got Florida and Tampa having to travel pretty much the same distance to play Ottawa and Montreal for their divisional matchups. And not only that, but Winnipeg STILL has to travel the same distance south to play Dallas in their new divisional matchups. Likewise for the likes of the distance between Edm/Cal to Phx/Ana

In fact, about the only thing this divisional change does is help out Carolina, Washington and Columbus, because now their travel schedule is next to nill (since I believe the new schedule is ALL divisional games, right?)

The most obvious solution that has been pointed out by fully half of HF is move the Jets to Central and Columbus to the SE.

The problem is that the League promised Detroit that they could move East at some point. Factor in that the Atlantic teams (the New York teams) and the Northeast teams (the Canadian teams and Boston) all wanted to remain together to keep their rivalries. In addition, I believe many wanted to kill the Southeast (which is really what is going on here- half of the SE moves to the Atlantic, and the other half to the Northeast) for being such a weak division and a home ice guarantee for a much weaker team.

With that in mind, and with the fact that it is logistically impossible to 'fix' some West's travel schedules (Dallas and Colorado are in the middle of nowhere), and we get this.

 

[tarheelhockey]

Good. Another barometer to determining just how knowledgeable the guy is who's arguing with you about hockey, right?

This will be the source of a lot of heated arguments where both parties turn out to be wrong

 

[Novacane]

So we play every team twice. I like that.

 

[Blueline Bomber]

All divisional games? Did I miss a sarcasm emoticon somewhere?

Admittedly, I haven't followed this realignment that closely, but I thought at one point, the structure was set up so that teams would only play teams in their own division, until the playoffs.

So our entire schedule would be CLB/WSH/NYR/NYI/NJD/PIT/PHI until we (hopefully) make the playoffs, in which case, we'd get the opportunity to play teams in Division C

Probably mistaken though.

 

[Finlandia WOAT]

Admittedly, I haven't followed this realignment that closely, but I thought at one point, the structure was set up so that teams would only play teams in their own division, until the playoffs.

So our entire schedule would be CLB/WSH/NYR/NYI/NJD/PIT/PHI until we (hopefully) make the playoffs, in which case, we'd get the opportunity to play teams in Division C

Probably mistaken though.

Don't quote me on this, but I think only the first round of the playoffs are divisional.

 

[Blueline Bomber]

Don't quote me on this, but I think only the first round of the playoffs are divisional.

Yeah, I just took the time to read the article on NHL.com

We play every team at least twice. My bad.

 

[tarheelhockey]

Admittedly, I haven't followed this realignment that closely, but I thought at one point, the structure was set up so that teams would only play teams in their own division, until the playoffs.

So our entire schedule would be CLB/WSH/NYR/NYI/NJD/PIT/PHI until we (hopefully) make the playoffs, in which case, we'd get the opportunity to play teams in Division C

Probably mistaken though.

No, the schedule is actually a little more liberal now in the sense that we at least get to see every team visit every arena.

The only part that is "divisional" is the first round of the playoffs, for the teams that happen to be in the 2 and 3 seeds. Very little else has changed, really.

 

[Joe McGrath]

Admittedly, I haven't followed this realignment that closely, but I thought at one point, the structure was set up so that teams would only play teams in their own division, until the playoffs.

So our entire schedule would be CLB/WSH/NYR/NYI/NJD/PIT/PHI until we (hopefully) make the playoffs, in which case, we'd get the opportunity to play teams in Division C

Probably mistaken though.

Yeah it's only the playoffs you play your own division.

Home and Home vs West
3 games against other East division teams
4 against 5 divisional opponents
5 against 2 remaining divisional opponents

 

[tarheelhockey]

Yeah it's only the playoffs you play your own division.

* unless you are a division winner or a wild card, in which case you might not play a division opponent, but you still might, depending on whether your division's 4 and 5 seeds and division winner had more points than the other division's 4 and 5 seeds and division winner, and then luck of the draw once all these seeds are re-sorted according to conference.

 

[Novacane]

I'll just let the experts figure this out...

 

[Joe McGrath]

* unless you are a division winner or a wild card, in which case you might not play a division opponent, but you still might, depending on whether your division's 4 and 5 seeds and division winner had more points than the other division's 4 and 5 seeds and division winner, and then luck of the draw once all these seeds are re-sorted according to conference.

Right. They made everything convoluted so they didn't have to hear *****ing about unfair divisions, all while have 2 less teams in one conference. Morons.

 

[Blueline Bomber]

My biggest concern is having the Rangers in the same division. Getting Marc Staal was a stretch in the first place (at least, IMO), simply because there's never been any indication that he wants to leave NY.

But now that we're divisional rivals with the Rangers, I see that slim chance of getting Marc get even smaller. I doubt they'd trade a good #1/2 defenseman to a divisional rival, even if Marc wants out.

 

[tarheelhockey]

My biggest concern is having the Rangers in the same division. Getting Marc Staal was a stretch in the first place (at least, IMO), simply because there's never been any indication that he wants to leave NY.

But now that we're divisional rivals with the Rangers, I see that slim chance of getting Marc get even smaller. I doubt they'd trade a good #1/2 defenseman to a divisional rival, even if Marc wants out.

All we have to do is wait till he's a free agent

 

[DaveG]

We all know the realignment's #1 priority: getting Detroit into the Eastern Conference.

Bingo. There's no other reason not to propose the re-alignment they offered before the lockout. This was all about Detroit, unfortunately. Can't wait to see the **** they try to raise when Quebec gets an expansion team/Phoenix.