So this is how it played out in the end - déjà vu all over again.
The National Hockey League's Board of Governors spent much of Tuesday's much-anticipated meeting, discussing the hot-button issue of the day — what, if anything, to do with its increasingly unpopular schedule. They voted on two concepts — one that would restore the original pre-lockout schedule; one that would tweak it slightly — and neither received the necessary two-thirds majority required to approve a change.
One proposal fell a single vote short; the other failed by two votes. The net result: Even if more teams supported a revamped schedule than didn't, the wishes of the minority prevailed.
According to commissioner Gary Bettman, that was the best solution, when there were so many diverging opinions - to retain the status quo through the current three-year scheduling cycle and then revisit the issue again at the end of next year.
Short term, it means that Canada's Western Conference teams will not play Canada's Eastern Conference teams next season for the first time since the league expanded into Vancouver, Edmonton and Calgary respectively. It'll also play havoc with the Hockey Day In Canada schedule, which traditionally features a triple header of games involving only the Canadian-based teams. Next year, two games will out-of-necessity feature an American opponent.
On the plus side, it means that the Pittsburgh Penguins' emerging star, Sidney Crosby, will finally get a chance to play on the road against the Canucks, Oilers and Flames. Next year, the Atlantic Division is scheduled to play its out-of-conference away games against the Northwest Division.
The results were similar to those that occurred at December's board of governors meeting, which precipitated the formation of a committee to study scheduling options — and you knew the vote was going to be too close to call.
The Canadian teams desperately wanted a change — and would have supported either of the two initiatives that were put a vote. Sadly, enough teams in the Boston-New York-Philadelphia corridor liked things the way they were and wouldn't budge from their previous positions.
Bettman, who usually says little about the internal workings of the board, acknowledged that he supported one of two alternatives, either retaining the status quo, or adopting the least dramatic change — which would have reduced the number of divisional games from eight to seven and replaced them with four out-of-conference games.
If Bettman had pushed harder for a change, could that have swung a couple of votes to the yes side?
He didn't think so.
"Some of you think I throw lightning bolts," said Bettman. "The fact is, I do report to a board and the board has the final say. "Unlike lots of other things we've done as a league, where everybody can focus on doing things from a league-wide basis, the schedule's kind of personal. It's market-specific. It's rivalry specific. It gets emotional. In the absence of what I call a catalyzing event - a reason to have to do it — it becomes more difficult. So for example, if Pittsburgh has to move, I guarantee you this issue would get resolved. If they don't have to move, maybe we'll just sit tight and see.
One of the mitigating factors working against a change was the uncertainty over the future of the Pittsburgh Penguins' franchise. If the Penguins eventually do relocate, the most appealing alternatives, Kansas City or Houston, would oblige them to transfer to the Western Conference. Some board members thought it made no sense to change the schedule now, if ultimately they need to address the issue of realignment again perhaps as early as June.
So the NHL will continue on a course in which its premier gate attraction, the Penguins' Sidney Crosby, will appear in each of the Western Conference markets only once every three years. The Edmonton Oilers, for one, saw no logic in that and their perspective is unique since 25 years ago, they had the Crosby of the previous generation, one Wayne Gretzky, in their line-up.
How would the league have felt if, in the prime of their careers, Gretzky's Oilers had paid just the one visit every three years to Manhattan? It wouldn't have been good for anybody.
Since it was the selfish needs of a few that prevailed Tuesday, about the only way justice will be done is if Crosby ultimately became a Western Conference player. Once the shoe was on the other foot, then you might see a shift in thinking among some of those same foot-draggers. It would probably take something that dramatic to get them thinking big-picture thoughts, an all-too-common shortcoming of the NHL, new or old.
