Injuries...
Where are you getting your numbers? I double checked Buffalo to start, and have totally different results. I used the NHL Game By Game report and got this:
Type|Total|Games|Average
Div|279,511|16|17469
Conf|328,352|20|16418
Other|84,466|5|16893
Also, the sheer unbalanced nature of the scheduling is going to hurt rational analysis here. There are 4 games in division, you get a nice sample there. 2 in conference, but 20 games total still counts for half the games in the season.
But you get just 1 game to try and judge how teams feel about inter-conference games, and even worse, just one division. Some years you'll have a sexy division visit, and other years a dud division. And they might not even be the same, IE to Vancouver the Northeast will be very popular, but all those Canadian teams might not draw well in Florida, etc.
The reason I feel teams should play each other every year, home and away is to ensure that you have a chance of seeing the top players each season.
I mean, as a Canuck fan, there was massive panic on the night that Ovechkin and the Caps played the Avs and he took that shot off the foot in the dying seconds and hobbled off to the bench. We were freaking out that we wouldn't see him until his 5th NHL season.
Hockey is a contact sport, so guys are going to be hurt or have the flu. Last thing anyone wants to see is a star player go down before an inter-conference game. Had the Pens played the west during Crosby's groin pull, can you imagine the fuming that would have been heard by the Pacific division teams the Pens were to play this year?
It's interesting to compare the NHL to the NBA, same # of games and location of the teams is pretty much the same, execpt for 2 more teams in Texas vs. Alberta and two in Northeast Canada vs. Central USA (Mil & Ind). NBA plays home and away for each team and at most they play their divison 4 times. NHL plays 10 inter-conference games and 8 divisional games.
I also believe that with a Cap in place, that by nature of business, a bad team one year can quickly turn itself around in the next year or two. Blues are bad now, but with the additions of a couple of prospects next season in Johnson, Okposo, etc. and signing a free agent or two and dumping of Tkachuk, Guerin, Dovarek, Brewer for youngsters, things can change quickly.
The Flyers, with Forsberg probably not coming back to Philly next season, Rathje possibly retiring, dumping of Esche, Nedved, Calder, and maybe waiving Hatcher, the Flyers free up a tonne of cap room to get better.
A team may not draw well this year, but next year could be intriguing to see, just like in the NFL.