NHL Divisional realignment

So the Atlanta Thrashers are now officially the Winnipeg Jets. The NHL has decided not to re-align the divisions this year, which will result in three trips to Winnipeg for the Caps. However, should the NHL decide to re-align, how would it look? Here's some potential ideas being thrown around.


My proposal(s)
Both my proposals have Winnipeg moving to the Northwest division so they play Calgary, Edmonton, and Vancouver six times a year. The differences lie in who moves out of the Northwest division. The two non-Canadian teams each have an opportunity to move and this is how I feel it would shake out

Proposal #1

Current	Proposed
Atlantic	Atlantic
New Jersey Devils	New Jersey Devils
New York Islanders	New York Islanders
New York Rangers	New York Rangers
Philadelphia Flyers	Philadelphia Flyers
Pittsburgh Penguins	Pittsburgh Penguins
Northeast	Northeast
Boston Bruins	Boston Bruins
Buffalo Sabres	Buffalo Sabres
Montreal Canadiens	Montreal Canadiens
Ottawa Senators	Ottawa Senators
Toronto Maple Leafs	Toronto Maple Leafs
Southeast	Southeast
Carolina Hurricanes	Carolina Hurricanes
Florida Panthers	Florida Panthers
Tampa Bay Lightning	Nashville Predators
Washington Capitals	Tampa Bay Lightning
Winnipeg Jets	Washington Capitals
Central	Central
Chicago Blackhawks	Chicago Blackhawks
Columbus Blue Jackets	Columbus Blue Jackets
Detroit Red Wings	Detroit Red Wings
Nashville Predators	Minnesota Wild
St. Louis Blues	St. Louis Blues
Northwest	Northwest
Calgary Flames	Calgary Flames
Colorado Avalanche	Colorado Avalanche
Edmonton Oilers	Edmonton Oilers
Minnesota Wild	Vancouver Canucks
Vancouver Canucks	Winnipeg Jets
Pacific	Pacific
Anaheim Ducks	Anaheim Ducks
Dallas Stars	Dallas Stars
Los Angeles Kings	Los Angeles Kings
Phoenix Coyotes	Phoenix Coyotes
San Jose Sharks	San Jose Sharks

Why this works:
This is by far, the easiest fix, Winnipeg moves out, you put Minnesota with it's central time zone buddies, and then move the geographically closest team to the southeast into the southeast division! Now Pekka Rinne and the Predators play in a conference where they can make the playoffs every year which will bring increased fan support to Nashville as well as an opportunity to play the eastern conference powerhouses twice a year at home.

Current	Proposed
Atlantic	Atlantic
New Jersey Devils	New Jersey Devils
New York Islanders	New York Islanders
New York Rangers	New York Rangers
Philadelphia Flyers	Philadelphia Flyers
Pittsburgh Penguins	Pittsburgh Penguins
Northeast	Northeast
Boston Bruins	Boston Bruins
Buffalo Sabres	Buffalo Sabres
Montreal Canadiens	Montreal Canadiens
Ottawa Senators	Ottawa Senators
Toronto Maple Leafs	Toronto Maple Leafs
Southeast	Southeast
Carolina Hurricanes	Carolina Hurricanes
Florida Panthers	Florida Panthers
Tampa Bay Lightning	Nashville Predators
Washington Capitals	Tampa Bay Lightning
Winnipeg Jets	Washington Capitals
Central	Central
Chicago Blackhawks	Chicago Blackhawks
Columbus Blue Jackets	Columbus Blue Jackets
Detroit Red Wings	Dallas Stars
Nashville Predators	Detroit Red Wings
St. Louis Blues	St. Louis Blues
Northwest	Northwest
Calgary Flames	Calgary Flames
Colorado Avalanche	Edmonton Oilers
Edmonton Oilers	Minnesota Wild
Minnesota Wild	Vancouver Canucks
Vancouver Canucks	Winnipeg Jets
Pacific	Pacific
Anaheim Ducks	Anaheim Ducks
Dallas Stars	Colorado Avalanche
Los Angeles Kings	Los Angeles Kings
Phoenix Coyotes	Phoenix Coyotes
San Jose Sharks	San Jose Sharks

Why this works:
Colorado has to travel the furthest of all teams in the Northwest and are geographically closer to their Pacific division. Minnesota stays in the northwest since they are the most northern state in the US and they border Manitoba allowing for fans of both teams to journey back and forth. In addition, it keeps their rivalries with the Canadian teams. Colorado moves to the pacific, pushing out the only team that is actually bordering the Atlantic Ocean sans Gulf of Mexico into the Central. I could either have Dallas move to the southeast and then you'd have all the Philly-Dallas-New York-Washington rivalries like in the NFL, but it doesn't make much sense travel-wise, so it has to be Nashville once again with Dallas moving to the central so that they can take on Detroit, Columbus, Nashville, and Chicago.

Darren Everson of the Wall Street Journal came up with a proposal that would be the most economic on traveling.

Current	Proposed
Atlantic	Atlantic
New Jersey Devils	Boston Bruins
New York Islanders	New Jersey Devils
New York Rangers	New York Islanders
Philadelphia Flyers	New York Rangers
Pittsburgh Penguins	Philadelphia Flyers
Northeast	Northeast
Boston Bruins	Buffalo Sabres
Buffalo Sabres	Montreal Canadiens
Montreal Canadiens	Ottawa Senators
Ottawa Senators	Pittsburgh Penguins
Toronto Maple Leafs	Toronto Maple Leafs
Southeast	Southeast
Carolina Hurricanes	Carolina Hurricanes
Florida Panthers	Florida Panthers
Tampa Bay Lightning	Nashville Predators
Washington Capitals	Tampa Bay Lightning
Winnipeg Jets	Washington Capitals
Central	Central
Chicago Blackhawks	Chicago Blackhawks
Columbus Blue Jackets	Columbus Blue Jackets
Detroit Red Wings	Dallas Stars
Nashville Predators	Detroit Red Wings
St. Louis Blues	St. Louis Blues
Northwest	Northwest
Calgary Flames	Calgary Flames
Colorado Avalanche	Edmonton Oilers
Edmonton Oilers	Minnesota Wild
Minnesota Wild	Vancouver Canucks
Vancouver Canucks	Winnipeg Jets
Pacific	Pacific
Anaheim Ducks	Anaheim Ducks
Dallas Stars	Colorado Avalanche
Los Angeles Kings	Los Angeles Kings
Phoenix Coyotes	Phoenix Coyotes
San Jose Sharks	San Jose Sharks

Why this works:
Saves money on travelling and gas expenses. However, I would like to note that you have to keep Boston in the Northeast and Pittsburgh in the Atlantic. The Boston-Montreal and Pittsburgh-Philadelphia bouts draw huge crowds for the NHL.

If you have any ideas on re-alignment, feel free to comment with your thoughts

Scheduling
There's also been scenarios where Bettman will request 4 divisions of 7 or 8 teams named the East, South, Midwest, and Pacific. Mr. Bettman, the trend has been increasing the amount of divisions, not taking them away. Look at the table below

League	Year	Conference	Old Divisions	New Divisions
NFL	2002	AFC	East, Central, West	East, North, South, West
		NFC	East, Central, West	East, North, South, West
NBA	2004	East	Atlantic, Central	Atlantic, Central, Southeast
		West	Midwest, Pacific	Northwest, Pacific, Southwest
MLB	1994	AL	East, West	East, Central, West
		NL	East, West	East, Central, West

Although if he were to make it four divisions of 8 or 7 teams while retaining 15 team conferences. His math is proposed as follows. Each team would play a home-and-home with every team outside it's division and four games against each team in it's division. How does this math work out?
If your team is in an 8 team division:
You would play both seven team divisions and the other 8 team division twice:
(7+7+8)*2 = 44 games. That leaves 38 games to play against the other seven teams in your division.
If your team is in a 7 team division:
You would play both 8 team divisions and the other 7 team division once:
(8+8+7)*2 = 46 games. That leaves 36 games to play against the other six teams in your division.

The math doesn't add up. A 7-team division would be able to play each team in their division 6 times, however, an 8 team division would only be able to play each team in their division 7.428 times. Hm... Or he could do an unbalanced schedule... somehow... i don't know all the details... in my defense though, if he wants to have all the teams play each other at least once a year home and home, that would be a total of 58 games, leaving 24 games to play.... hm... not going to work

Here's my proposal to scheduling. Add two more games to the schedule and add another week to the season. So start the season October 1st and end it between April 13th to April 15th. It'll give players a little more time to rest and reduce the amount of 4-game weeks as well as fix all scheduling problems.

Proposed 84-game schedule:
Play each team in your division 6 times: (4 other teams x 6 games = 24 games)
Play each team in your conference but not division 4 times: (10 teams x 4 games = 40 games)
That's 64 games you play against your conference.
Now, with 15 teams in the west and 20 games left, how does this work out? Much like how the NFL rotates inter-conference matchups, the NHL can do the same. So you would play one division in the other conference twice and the other teams in the conference once. So each team would still play every other team, but the home-and-home would rotate. However, 5 of the games against the other conference would be played on the road and 5 would be played at home to keep the balanced home-and-home schedule. Also, to keep it fair. During the two years that you would not play the other conference's divisions home-and-home, you would play them on the road one year and then back at home the next year or vice-versa.
For example:
2012-2013
Northwest vs Northeast (home-and-home)
Pacific vs Atlantic (home-and-home)
Central vs Southeast (home-and-home)

2013-2014
Pacific vs Northeast (home-and-home)
Central vs Atlantic (home-and-home)
Northwest vs Southeast (home-and-home)

2014-2015
Central vs Northeast (home-and-home)
Northwest vs Atlantic (home-and-home)
Pacific vs Southeast (home-and-home)

Using the current division format:
Washington Capitals in Southeast plays Central home-and-home in 2012-2013
They would play Vancouver, Anaheim, Colorado, Minnesota, and Dallas on the road
They would play Edmonton, Calgary, San Jose, Los Angeles, and Phoenix at home

Washington Capitals in Southeast plays Northwest home-and-home in 2013-2014
They would play San Jose, Los Angeles, Phoenix, Detroit, and St. Louis on the road
They would play Anaheim, Dallas, Nashville, Chicago, and Columbus at home

Washington Capitals in Southeast plays Pacific home-and-home in 2014-2015
They would play Nashville, Chicago, Columbus, Edmonton, and Calgary on the road
They would play Vancouver, Colorado, Minnesota, Detroit and St. Louis at home

This would give every team the opportunity to host a team from the other conference two times every three years and put them on tv for four games every three years as opposed to the current system where you play every team in the other conference once and have random home-and-home with three of them. This will appease most NHL fans and even though some may oppose adding two games to the schedule, adding another week to the season so that there is more time for rest and recovery throughout the season should help with appeasing players/personnel/fan As it stands, the NHL season is roughly 190 days long, so making it 195 with a few more rest days throughout the season is better for teams.
The playoff format would remain the same. Ironically, this past post-season was the longest post-season I have ever witnessed with every round having at least one series that went 7 games. However, the NHL awards can still be the fourth Wednesday of June as the playoffs should be finished by the preceding Sunday. The first round would end in the first week of May. the second round would end in the third week of May. The Conference finals would be two weeks ending before the first week of June, and the next two weeks would be the Stanley Cup and the cup-winning team can celebrate Monday and Tuesday. Of course, if the playoffs proceed more quickly, then there would be more time for the cup-winners to celebrate. However, I doubt a repeat of this year's Stanley Cup playoffs will ever happen again with an astounding 7 series going 7 games with Boston or Vancouver participating in four of them.

Anyways, that's my thoughts on re-alignment in the NHL and scheduling future seasons. I hope you found this article to be entertaining and provide you with thoughts on the future of the NHL and how you'd like it to end up. Feel free to comment below.