The National Hockey League along with other sports leagues across the country and world were forced to shut down normal operations thanks to the spread of the novel coronavirus in an effort to curb the illness’ spread.
It’s now been well over a month since we’ve last seen NHL hockey, but fans may have just gotten some pretty exciting news.
Florida Panthers president spoke on a conference call earlier today and said that while nothing has been finalized, the League is reportedly eying a July return date once some very important particulars are taken care of.
“At least for the NHL, we’re trying to target sometime in July and then when we feel that players are safe, we have enough testing, and have enough ways to get back on the ice, it’s probably going to be contained to playing at four or five neutral sites, so that’s all being discussed right now,” Caldwell said. “My guess is that we would start with either limited fans or empty arenas.
“None of this has been finalized but this is the direction things are going.”
At the time of the stoppage last month, teams were entering the final stretch of the regular season before the playoffs, which were scheduled to have gotten underway in early April.
The NHL had reportedly been exploring options to play games in neutral sites, potentially without fans in the stands to minimize risk of exposure.
– – Quotes via Matt Teague of TheScore Link – –
