George Richards, FHN Publisher
According to various reports, the NHL is looking into changing up its divisions for the 2020-21 season — so how would realignment affect the Panthers?
Currently, the Panthers are part of the Atlantic Division.
Due to the pandemic, the Canadian border is closed to nonessential travel so word is, the seven teams in Canada would stay where they are and play amongst themselves in their own division.
Where does that leave the rest of the league?
For the Panthers, and everyone else in the Atlantic, that means no games against the Ottawa Senators, Montreal Canadiens and Toronto Maple Leafs.
When the 2019-20 season was halted on March 12, only Toronto was a playoff team.
Montreal ended up making the postseason for the return and ended up advancing to the playoffs after upsetting the Penguins as the No. 12 seed in the east.
According to Greg Wyshynski of ESPN.com, the Panthers would likely be lumped into a reworked Central Division.
Why the Central when the Panthers are the southernmost NHL team based on the Atlantic coast?
Well, to reduce travel, the northeast teams would be kept together as much as possible.
That allows the New York/New Jersey, Boston, Philadelphia and Washington teams extremely limited travel. The rest of the NHL doesn’t get off that easy — including the Panthers and Tampa Bay Lightning.
If Wyshynski’s realignment is current, the Panthers would stay with Atlantic foes Tampa Bay and Detroit; a good number of other teams would join the mix.
According to Wyshynski, here is how the Panthers’ new division would look like:
IN: Florida Panthers, Tampa Bay Lightning, Chicago Blackhawks, Columbus Blue Jackets, Detroit Red Wings, Nashville Predators, Pittsburgh Penguins, St. Louis Blues.
OUT: Boston Bruins, Buffalo Sabres, Montreal Canadiens, Ottawa Senators, Toronto Maple Leafs.
Under this realignment, the Panthers would lose a powerhouse Boston squad as well as probable non-playoff teams Ottawa and Buffalo as well as a borderline Montreal team.
Florida would keep the reigning Stanley Cup champions in Tampa Bay, the 2019 champs in St. Louis as well as potential playoff teams Columbus, Nashville and Pittsburgh.
Making the playoffs appears to be a bit of a tougher road in this new division than how it would go if the Atlantic was kept intact. Aside from Detroit, there are not too many easy matchups in this new Central.
Pierre LeBrun of The Athletic spells out how the postseason could look like under these new circumstances, but with these teams, Florida’s road to the postseason definitely did not get easier.
Of course, we do not even know if there will be a season in 2021 — we can lose the 2020 part of it now, right?
On Monday, Jimmy Murphy reported the potential for a 48-game season which, we could assume, would be divisional play only.
That means 48 games against the likes of St. Louis, Tampa Bay, Nashville and Pittsburgh.
Not an easy road. At all.