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Greg Wyshynski, ESPN
SUNRISE, Fla. — The 4 Nations Face-Off tournament winner will be crowned at TD Garden in Boston next February.
The NHL and NHL Players’ Association revealed details to their new international tournament, which will feature players representing the United States, Canada, Finland and Sweden competing in a round-robin tournament from Feb. 12-20, 2025.
Four games will be played at Bell Centre, home of the Montreal Canadiens. TD Garden, home of the Boston Bruins, will host two round-robin games — Canada-Finland and U.S.-Sweden — as well as the championship game Feb. 20.
“Two iconic cities. We thought it was important to have some exposure in Canada,” NHL deputy commissioner Bill Daly said Saturday. “Obviously we have 32 franchises, so we could have put it anywhere, but those were the two that kind of rose to the top.”
The current North American NHL broadcast rights holders — Disney, Turner and Rogers — will carry the 4 Nations Face-Off games. On Feb. 15, 2025, ABC will have a doubleheader of Sweden-Finland and the highly anticipated meeting between the U.S. and Canada at Bell Centre.
ESPN will carry the championship game.
All games in the 4 Nations Face-Off will be played in accordance with NHL rules. Each team will play three tournament games in a traditional round-robin format, under the following points system: 3 for a win in regulation time; 2 for a win in overtime/shootout; 1 for a loss in overtime/shootout; and 0 for a loss in regulation time. The two teams with the best tournament record will then advance to a one-game final.
The first six players for each team will be announced June 28.
“The players are just absolutely thrilled about this, and the opportunity to get international competition again, kind of as a pre-tournament to the [2026] Olympics,” NHLPA executive director Marty Walsh said.
The NHL and the NHLPA opted not to have semifinals or a consolation game before the championship game because of the short timing of the event.
“We’re doing this tournament in lieu of the All-Star Game. It’s an extended period of time, and we didn’t want to make it too extended,” Daly said.
The 4 Nations Face-Off is also noteworthy for who isn’t there. Bruins star David Pastrnak tweaked the NHL after Czechia won the IIHF world championship last month, posting a photo of himself holding the trophy with the caption: “Maybe Four Nation invite now?”
The tournament also doesn’t include Germany, home to Edmonton Oilers star Leon Draisaitl, or Switzerland, which has several prominent NHL players.
NHL commissioner Gary Bettman said that the time window for the tournament meant the field needed to be limited.
“We also wanted for this tournament, as we get ready for the Olympics and the World Cup, to be all NHL players. These four countries fit the bill better than any others,” he said.
Then there’s the ongoing issue with Russia, which was also left out of the tournament. The IIHF has banned Russia and Belarus from international hockey until 2025 due to the war in Ukraine.
“There’s only so much we can do under the existing circumstances as we see them,” Bettman said. “Whether it’s 4 Nations or World Cup, people are going to have opinions as to things we could have done differently. I think it’s fair to say that a lot of time and effort with the players’ association has led us to what we think is the best place for us to be right now.”
The NHL and NHLPA commented on several more league topics during the nearly 40-minute news conference:
Salary cap for 2024-25
The NHL and the NHLPA announced that the salary cap for next season will be set at $88 million, slightly higher than earlier projected.
The salary cap floor is $65 million.
“I know the general managers and the teams are excited to have more flexibility, and it means that the revenues are as robust as we’ve been telling you all along,” Bettman said.
“I predict that it will continue to go up. I believe we’ll continue to have robust growth in the cap.”
Walsh said he’s hopeful that the players will get back all of the money they’ve put in escrow this season in case NHL owners have a revenue shortfall. Escrow was set at 6% for 2023-24.
What’s next for LTIR
One way teams have gotten around the constraints of the salary cap is through the long-term injured reserve exemption. Teams such as the Tampa Bay Lightning and Vegas Golden Knights have had players on LTIR, where their salaries don’t count against the cap, at the end of the regular season only to activate them for Game 1 of the playoffs.
Daly solicited feedback from general managers on the NHL’s executive committee in March on whether the league should investigate changes to LTIR rules. He said the majority that he has heard from would like to see LTIR rules addressed in some way but that “none of them thought it was a major competitive issue in the short term.”
Daly left the door open for negotiating changes to LTIR rules with the players in the next collective bargaining agreement. The current one has two years left.
No timeline for expansion
Bettman and Walsh both declined to offer a timeline for future NHL expansion.
“We continue to deal with expressions of interest. We’re not going to, at this point, unveil a formal expansion process,” Bettman said. “We are gratified by the fact that at least half a dozen places continue to express an interest in us.”
Both the NHL and the NHLPA were effusive in their praise of the league’s newest market in Utah, where the Arizona Coyotes relocated for next season. Smith Entertainment Group, owner of the Utah team, has received more than 34,000 season-ticket deposits since April 18. Season tickets for the team went on sale to the public Friday, and Bettman said the early returns are “extraordinarily robust” for the team.
“I think things are going even better than we could have hoped based on the short timeframe that they’ve had to work with,” Bettman said. “They’re literally drinking from a fire hose and they’re doing it unbelievably well.”
Walsh said the feedback from players has been uniformly positive.
“They’re finally getting a chance to play in an arena that they should be playing in,” he said. The Coyotes had played home games at the 5,000-seat Mullett Arena in Arizona.
Walsh was a vocal critic of the Coyotes, who called the college hockey arena home as they sought to construct a new NHL-sized building. But the NHLPA director said he’s fine with the NHL having brokered a relocation deal that allows Arizona owner Alex Meruelo to revive the Coyotes as an expansion team.
“It wasn’t personal,” Walsh said. “I mean, it might’ve sounded personal, but it’s not. I was representing my players. If he’s able to live by the terms of whatever they agreed on, we’ll see what happens.”
No update on Canadian quartet
Daly said it’s “status quo” for the four players charged in the sexual assault investigation of Canada’s 2018 world juniors hockey team and their pending free agent status. NHL players Carter Hart of the Philadelphia Flyers, Dillon Dube of the Calgary Flames, and Michael McLeod and Cal Foote of the New Jersey Devils are all restricted free agents this summer and as such need qualifying offers from their teams to retain their rights.
“I’ve gotten a couple inquiries from clubs as of right now. The status quo would be that whatever rights the CBA had for clubs and players, we’ll adhere to that,” said Daly, who said he has spoken with the NHLPA about the issue. “It’s quite possible that clubs will have the decision of qualifying or not as of the end of this month.”
The players won’t go to trial before next season.
Outdoor game in Florida?
Bettman didn’t shut down speculation that the Florida Panthers, who hosted Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Final on Saturday night, could soon have a game inside LoanDepot Park, home of the Miami Marlins.
After next season, the Panthers and Utah will be the only teams not to have participated in an NHL stadium game.
“I understand it’s very nice. It also has a roof and is air-conditioned,” Bettman said. “I’m not going to break any news today, but we are mindful of the fact that at some point it would be good for the Panthers to be in an outdoor game and so we continue to explore options.
“We did something a little different this past year by doing two games in the 24 hours in the same venue. We can only speculate what the future might hold in that regard.”