New Alignment, Rules Coming to AHL in 2016-17

The AHL Board of Governors has approved a new alignment for the league in the 2016-17 season as the league’s annual meeting has concluded.

With the movement of Portland to Springfield and Springfield to Tucson, Arizona, the AHL’s Eastern Conference will feature one less team for the upcoming season. 14 teams will call the East their home, while 16 teams will call the Western Conference their home. Hershey will stay in the Atlantic Division, along with Bridgeport, Hartford, Lehigh Valley, Providence, Springfield, and Wilkes-Barre/Scranton.

#AHLAlignment pic.twitter.com/M8G7hzTQs6

— AHL (@TheAHL) July 7, 2016

The league will continue to play 76 games, while the California teams and Tucson get to play less at only 68 games. Division standings will continue to be ranked using points percentage with the playoffs continuing its traditional 5-7-7-7 games-per-round format, with a division semi-finals, finals, conference finals, then Calder Cup finals schedule.

A new rule this year will see teams wear dark jerseys at home on a regular basis for the first time since the 2004-05 season. Teams will wear their white sweaters at home up until Christmas break. Once the fat man comes down the chimney, he will deliver 30 teams their new home dark jerseys to wear the rest of the season.

Also, the league has changed some rules around fighting. Here is all the changes regarding that from the press release:

Rule 46 (“Fighting”)/Rule 23 (“Game Misconducts”)
• Players who enter into a fight prior to, at, or immediately following the drop of the puck for a faceoff will be assessed an automatic game misconduct in addition to other penalties assessed.

• During the regular season, any player who incurs his 10th fighting major shall be suspended automatically for one (1) game. For each subsequent fighting major up to 13, the player shall also be suspended automatically for one (1) game.

• During the regular season, any player who incurs his 14th fighting major shall be suspended automatically for two (2) games. For each subsequent fighting major, the player shall also be suspended automatically for two (2) games.

• In any instance where the opposing player was assessed an instigator penalty, the fighting major shall not count towards the player’s total for this rule.

These rules should cut down fighting in the game, along with the role of an enforcer on a team.

Other rule changes include teams will not be able to call timeout after icing the puck to give their players a break. This could create more scoring opportunities as possible tired players will have to work the puck up the ice more to get a chance at a line change.

That’s all for rule changes for the league in……wait…..do you hear that? It’s the end of regulation and the Zamboni’s aren’t started….that means…..THE DRY SCRAPE IS DEAD. DEAD. THE DRY SCRAPE IS DEAD. OH HAPPY DAYS.

But seriously why did it take so long to kill.