With the announcement that the National Hockey League has agreed upon a reworked divisional format, schedule and starting date for their 2020-21 campaign, all eyes turned to the AHL and whether it would be possible for them to play this season.

We received some answers this week (January 4, 2021) but there are still many more questions to be answered in the upcoming days and weeks.

Official American Hockey League Statement

American Hockey League President and Chief Executive Officer Scott Howson announced today that the 2020-21 season will include 28 teams when it gets underway on February 5.

The AHL will operate in five divisions this season. Further details, including schedule formats and playoffs, are still to be determined.

Four teams have been granted provisional relocations for the 2020-21 season: the Binghamton Devils will play in Newark, N.J.; the Ontario Reign will play in El Segundo, Calif.; the Providence Bruins will play in Marlborough, Mass.; and the San Diego Gulls will play in Irvine, Calif.

The Charlotte Checkers, Milwaukee Admirals and Springfield Thunderbirds have elected to opt-out of play for the 2020-21 season. All three teams will return to play in 2021-22.

In operation since 1936, the AHL serves as the top development league for all 31 National Hockey League teams. Nearly 90 percent of today’s NHL players are American Hockey League graduates, and more than 100 honored members of the Hockey Hall of Fame spent time in the AHL in their careers.’

So let’s begin with the three teams who shan’t be competing in the upcoming season.

Credit to Patrick Williams for the following quotes.

Milwaukee Admirals

Milwaukee Admirals President Jon Greenberg: “Nashville was very understanding that this was a very heavy lift for us. The best decision was to opt-out. It is painful.”

He added that 2021-22 is full-speed ahead.

Milwaukee owner Harris Turer will keep his staff employed going forward. “My staff and their families are my priority .” (Milwaukee has 19 full-time staff members)

Turer added that playing makes sense from a player-development perspective for Nashville, but the financial picture from a Milwaukee perspective was a much different story. “Unfortunately, the prospect of playing the season without fans and the lack of any revenue was too difficult to manage.”

Charlotte Checkers

Charlotte owner and CEO Michael Kahn in a written statement: “There are several travel, safety and player supply challenges to consider.”

“Those, coupled with the increasing number of new cases in our area, make it very unlikely that we will be able to host fans at our games in the near future.”

Springfield Thunderbirds

Springfield president Nate Costa in a written statement: “Over the past few months we have worked tirelessly with the St. Louis Blues to explore every possible avenue for returning to play this season.”

“As an independently owned franchise, our foremost obligation is to ensure that our team is financially viable for the long term, something that is not possible without gameday revenue.”

As expected it is independently owned teams who have opted out of playing in 2020-21 with their focus being ready for the 2021-22 campaign.

It’s perhaps somewhat of a surprise that so many independently owned teams shall be able to compete.

Those are Hershey Bears (Washington Capitals), Lehigh Valley Phantoms (Philadelphia Flyers), Providence Bruins (Boston Bruins), Cleveland Monsters (Columbus Blue Jackets), Syracuse Crunch (Tampa Bay Lightning), Utica Comets (Vancouver Canucks), Chicago Wolves (Carolina Hurricanes), Grand Rapids Griffins (Detroit Red Wings), Rockford IceHogs (Chicago Blackhawks) and Colorado Eagles (Colorado Avalanche).

Whether the above teams have the financial clout to survive a shortened season without any ticket revenue or are receiving extensive help from their NHL affiliates is something I am sure will be elaborated on at a later point.

Relocation

The four teams moving house for the 2020-21 campaign are doing so for different reasons.

The Binghamton Devils (Newark, N.J), Ontario Reign (El Segundo, Calif) and the San Diego Gulls (Irvine, Calif.) will all be playing out of their NHL team’s training facilities, which does make a great deal of sense from many aspects including financially.

The Providence Bruins will play in Marlborough, Massachusetts because their home, the Dunkin’ Donuts Center, is being used for Corona Virus purposes.

There is now a fifth team though it’s not really much of a location switch. The Laval Rocket will play home games at the Bell Centre (home of the Montreal Canadiens).

Affiliation

There is going to be a great deal of player movement and cross affiliation agreements deals made for the short-term.

These have now been finalised and are as follows.

• St. Louis Blues – Utica Comets

• Nashville Predators – Chicago Wolves

• Florida Panthers – Syracuse Crunch

It wasn’t that long ago that an NHL team would have prospects playing in multiple AHL teams so in some ways this isn’t an unusual proposition for many organisations.

Schedule

If you’re looking for a concrete answer here then I’m sorry to disappoint you.

I don’t have one and nor does anyone in the league at this moment.

It has been postulated that the Pacific Division will play around 40 games all told.

With the Pacific Division remaining intact from last year and then adding new club Henderson Silver Knights into the equation, it makes a great deal of sense. The logistics of that division with teams incredibly close geographically would make it easier to schedule more games than the rest of the league.

Has any team begun life in weirder circumstances than the Henderson Silver Knights are about to do?

The speculation is the remaining Atlantic, Canadian, North and Central divisions will have a schedule in the low thirty range.

Just three teams in the Atlantic division isn’t an ideal situation for all concerned but there aren’t many other alternatives available when the geography and less movement of players and staff is the key to making an AHL season work.

A four-team Canadian division isn’t exactly a whole lot better and Belleville, Laval, Manitoba and Toronto are all waiting for government approval.

It would certainly make sense for teams to fly into Manitoba and have a baseball-style schedule in which multiple games are played inside a reasonably short timeframe.

Playoffs? Who knows? A regular-season format is the first point of call and any kind of potential play-offs will be very much down to how North America is faring with the pandemic come springtime. Any speculation on a potential format would be just that – speculation.

Rosters

The AHL may decide to bin the rulebook just for 2020-21.

The development rule, brought in to stop teams filling their rosters with veterans, may be relaxed to allow teams to be competitive in trying circumstances.

NHL teams will have an extended taxi-squad and possibly allow some prospects who might have played in the AHL, to stay in Europe if that’s where they have been playing for weeks or months.

There is the possibility of the eligibility rule being relaxed if CHL leagues are cancelled.

So an 18yo OHL player who ordinarily would be NHL eligible but be sent back to junior if not ready for the step-up could play in the AHL if the Ontario Hockey League cancels their 2020-21 season (which is entirely possible).

My expectation is that the free-agency market will pick up as soon as a schedule is ratified and there are many high-profile players still available including the likes of Chris Mueller, Garret Sparks, Michael Mersch, Matt Puempel, Matt Donavan and Keegan Lowe.

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