The Stanley Cup Playoffs are the best part of a hockey season, bar none. And yet, NHL fans are wildly unsatisfied with the playoff format as it stands today.
On Wednesday, NHL commissioner Gary Bettman spoke to the media following the league’s annual GM meetings. While nothing major came out of the meetings, NHL fans did latch onto one point made by Bettman while he was discussing the upcoming playoffs.
Currently, the NHL uses a divisional format system for its playoffs, with the top three teams from each division qualifying for the postseason plus two wild cards from each conference. The format is very messy and complicated, all for the sake of getting divisional rivalries in the early rounds to increase watchability.
However, trying to force those divisional rivalries has come at the cost of losing some of the powerhouse teams way earlier than fans would like. Bettman and the NHL general managers, on the other hand, don’t believe there’s an issue with the league’s current divisional playoff format. At the GM meetings, Bettman said the NHL’s divisional playoff format is “working well” and no changes are needed to the system.
“[The current playoff format] is working well and we’re not looking to make any changes.”
Commissioner Gary Bettman says the NHL is not looking to go back to the 1v8 playoff format. Should they? pic.twitter.com/IWf2Wo6xBO
— Tim and Friends (@timandfriends) March 15, 2023
Many NHL fans — and players — would like to return to the 1-8 format, which would entirely forgo the wild card system that was created nearly a decade ago. Instead, the No. 1 and No. 8 seeds would play each other in the first round and the rest would follow suit, with reseeding after each round.
As expected, hockey fans did not take the news of the NHL sticking to its current playoff format well.