With news coming out that Seattle has been awarded a new NHL franchise and the league will be expanding to 32 teams, there is also a lot of talk regarding how the teams will be realigned and situated with different divisions.
As it currently stands with 31 teams, there is a conference imbalance, and the Central division only has 7 teams instead of 8. With this type of change and expansion, what better time to completely shift the way the NHL is aligned and structured. We saw change after the lockout in 2012, even before the addition of the league’s 31st team to Las Vegas.