NHL Realignment Project – Week 51
2012/12/10 20 Comments
A More Balanced East
Last week’s realignment got a little feedback on here and on Twitter that despite my best efforts, a few to many important rivalries got split up. Consider this week’s map a tweak of last week’s. While of course there is no silver bullet that will please all people and teams (hence this blog’s slogan “endless possibilities, no consensus), I think this is the best addressing of rivalries of the entire project thus far. An additional by-product of the tweaks is a more balanced set of teams in the two conferences on the east side of the map. Havalook:
The Map:
The Breakdown:
Once again, this week’s re-imagined league continues to use the NHL’s four-conference breakdown proposed last year. I’ve gone with the common names of the Stanley Cup winning teams from Seattle and Quebec—the Metropolitans and Bulldogs respectively. Side note: the Quebec Stanley Cup champs were only informally knowns as the Bulldogs, they were officially the Quebec Hockey Club at the time. I’m not advocating these names, my preference would be to let people from each of the cities vote on names vetted presented by the two franchises… none of that “let the people submit names for voting or using something hip at the time that will seem stupid in a couple of years” crap — I’m looking at you, Toronto RAPTORS! *facepalm* But for the map this week, I just when with the Metropolitans and the Bulldogs.
Again, conference names are an homage to the greatest players (arguably, of course) in the history of the teams of that conference. Gretzky (Oilers and Kings); Howe (Red Wings); Orr (Bruins); Lemieux (Penguins).
GRETZKY CONFERENCE |
Anaheim Ducks |
Calgary Flames |
Colorado Avalanche |
Edmonton Oilers |
Los Angeles Kings |
San Jose Sharks |
Seattle Metropolitans |
Vancouver Canucks |
HOWE CONFERENCE |
Chicago Blackhawks |
Colorado Avalanche |
Dallas Stars |
Detroit Red Wings |
Minnesota Wild |
Nashville Predators |
St. Louis Blues |
Winnipeg Jets |
ORR CONFERENCE |
Boston Bruins |
Buffalo Sabres |
Columbus Blue Jackets |
Montreal Canadiens |
Ottawa Senators |
Quebec Bulldogs |
Toronto Maple Leafs |
Washington Capitals |
LEMIEUX CONFERENCE |
Carolina Hurricanes |
Florida Panthers |
New Jersey Devils |
New York Islanders |
New York Rangers |
Philadelphia Flyers |
Pittsburgh Penguins |
Tampa Bay Lightning |
Gained teams:
Lost teams:
none
• Travel — Four conferences cut down on travel for the teams that currently have the heaviest burden (mainly Dallas, Winnipeg, Minnesota). Some of the teams with the light travel burdens right now add a little more (looking at you Lemieux Conference), but are still in much better shape than the frequent-flier champs out west. The only teams that have to got beyond one additional time zone for any in-conference game are the aforementioned Red Wings and Avalanche… and just to play each other. With that hatred, they won’t mind a bit.
• Heritage — The conferences are named for some of the greats from the history of the game. Only issue with this is having only four will spark countless debate on the choices (where are Richard, Kennedy Plante, Hull, Bossy, Smith, Lafleur, etc.)
• Erin Andrews — With both her faves in one conference (The Lightning and the Rangers), we can only expect more tweets, mentions and other additional exposure to the Queen of All Media (Oprah retired). I welcome all of it.
Scheduling:
Each team plays:
– against its seven conference-mates twice at home and twice on the road each:
4 games x 7 teams = 28 games
– against the teams in the other conferences once at home and once on the road:
2 games x 24 teams = 48 games
– half of each conference pair up and play an additional home-and-home series (switch the pairings each season):
2 games x 3 teams = 6 games
• Top four teams from each conference qualify for a “final four” style tournament. All series are best of seven.
• Round 1: Conference Semifinals (1 seed vs. 4 seed; 2 vs. 3 (based on overall record))
• Round 2: Conference Finals (first round winners play each other)
• Round 3: Stanley Cup Semifinals (best overall record of remaining teams picks it’s opponent for this round)
• Round 4: Stanley Cup Finals
As always, thanks for reading, and don’t forget to use the sharing buttons to spread the word and wish me luck on my impending fatherhood in February.
—Tom