NHL's Board of Governors rule on NHL expansion for the 2025/26 regular season

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Tom Banks
October 1, 2024 (9:31 PM)

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The NHL has been expected to entertain the idea of expansion in the near future, but it has been officially ruled out... for now at least.

In the past seven years, the NHL have added the Vegas Golden Knights, the Seattle Kraken and most recently, moved the Arizona Coyotes to Salt Lake City to create the Utah Hockey Club. However, there have been growing reports that expansion hasn't stopped for the NHL, with both Kevin Weekes and Andy Strickland noting that the league were pushing to add not one but two new teams in the near future.

Most fans around the NHL have expressed their disinterest in adding new teams to the NHL, with plenty of improvements needing to be made by the league before that should happen, making today's news great news for those that enjoy the league at 32 teams.

For now, however, both of those reports have officially been refuted, with the NHL's Board of Governors recently meeting, and while they revealed a very positive prediction for a $92.5 million salary cap for teams from 2025/26 (a $4.5 million increase from this season), it wasn't good news for those backing expansion.

According to Elliotte Friedman, there was nothing to come out on expansion from the meeting, meaning that 2025/26 is out for potential expansion, making the 2026/27 NHL season the earliest that the league can look to introduce team No. 33. With Houston, Atlanta, Toronto, Kansas City and Quebec City all reportedly having interest in a new NHL team, there's going to be continued talks for the foreseeable future, but for now at least, we won't be seeing another new NHL team.

Source: Hockey Feed
NHL Board of Governors rules on expansion in 2025-26