As an inhabitant of Southwestern Ontario I’ve definitely heard quite a bit about the scenario of Jim Balsillie’s bid to purchase the lowly Phoenix Coyotes and move them to this neck of the woods. As a hockey fan I think it would be great to have a team in the area. Since I’m an Ottawa Senators fan the prospect of being able to go to 3 games a season less then a half hour away really appeals to me.

The problem here is that it really is pie in the sky thinking that this will actually happen. While I think Gary Bettman and the NHL really have been negligent in expanding and relocating teams in an effort to grow the game, I understand why they are digging in their heels on this issue. Even if you put aside the fact that Bettman seems predisposed to not moving clubs back to Canada, the issue here is that it is a logistics nightmare to execute what Balsillie is proposing.

The big issue is that plucking a team from the Mountain (MST) timezone and relocating them squarely in the Eastern (EST) timezone. This would necessitate a move from the Western Conference to the Eastern Conference, which would be pretty problematic. If you add a team to the East it means a team gets pushed over into the West. For a long time the prospect of moving Atlanta to the West has been bandied about, which makes some sense.

The problem at hand here is how it would affect the divisional alignments. Moving the team to Hamilton essentially means they have to be squeezed into the Northeastern Division with Toronto, Ottawa, Buffalo, Montreal and Boston. Given the current divisional alignment of 6 divisions of 5 teams split into 2 conferences, putting another team in the Northeast creates a world of headaches for the NHL. You would have to move either Boston or Buffalo to the Atlantic division, which would bump either Pittsburgh or Philadelphia into the the Southeastern division. Making these changes would definitely screw up many of the traditional divisional rivalries. And that’s just the East.

In the Western Conference they have pretty much 2 options, both problematic. They can either just put Atlanta in Pacific Division where the Coyotes came from with Dallas, Anaheim, San Jose and LA, which creates loads more travel for the California teams who now have to fly to the Eastern timezone to play divisional games. Or you put Atlanta in the Central Division and move St Louis into the Pacific, which makes little to no sense.

Given all the changes it would require to move a single team from West to East you can understand why the NHL definitely doesn’t want this to come to pass. My feeling is that this really screws up the NHLs future plans for expansion going forward.  Awhile back I was discussing this topic of realignment and expansion and came up with this map.

The idea behind this map is for the NHL to expand to 32 teams, which is the holy grail for pro sports when it comes to scheduling games, aligning divisions and playoffs. This new setup involves 8 divisions of 4 teams in 2 conferences, very similar to the way the NFL is setup. My idea is contingent on the Coyotes staying put, 2 expansion teams being created and the Florida Panthers and Nashville Predators being moved to put teams in Hamilton, Winnipeg, Kansas City and Las Vegas.

Atlantic Division
Boston Bruins, New York Rangers, New York Islanders, New Jersey Devils

Northeastern Division
Ottawa Senators, Toronto Maple Leafs, Hamilton TBDs, Montreal Canadiens

New Eastern Division
Buffalo Sabres, Columbus Blue Jackets, Pittsburgh Penguins, Philadelphia Flyers

Southeastern Division
Washington Capitals, Carolina Hurricanes, Tampa Bay Lightning, Atlanta Thrashers

Central Division
Detroit Red Wings, Chicago Blackhawks, St Louis Blues, Minnesota Wild

Northwestern Division
Calgary Flames, Edmonton Oilers, Vancouver Canucks, Winnipeg Jets

Pacific Division
Anaheim Ducks, San Jose Sharks, LA Kings, Las Vegas TBDs

Southwest Division
Colorado Avalanche, Dallas Stars, KC Scouts, Phoenix Coyotes