![]() The NHL's playoff system has changed over the years. The Seattle Kraken began playing in the 2021–22 season, increasing the Western Conference to 16 teams and the Arizona Coyotes moved to the Central Division from the Pacific Division to balance out the conference. The NHL awarded a franchise to the city of Seattle on December 4, 2018. On June 22, 2016, the NHL awarded Las Vegas an expansion team that began play in 2017, and thus brought the total of Western Conference teams to 15. With this 2013 realignment, the Central Division is based almost entirely in the Central Time Zone (the only exception being the Colorado Avalanche, who are in the Mountain Time Zone), and the Pacific Division is based entirely within the Mountain and Pacific Time Zones. Its American teams joined the Central, while the Canadian teams returned to the Pacific. The Northwest Division was dissolved in 2013. Realignment in 1998 added a third division, the Northwest. When the names of conferences and divisions were changed in 1993, the Western Conference's divisions became the Central and Pacific. The 1981 realignment moved the Patrick Division to the Prince of Wales Conference and added that conference's Norris Division instead. The Campbell Conference originally consisted of the Patrick Division and the Smythe Division. These changes have been reversed, for the 2021–22 season. The other three remaining Central Division teams stayed in that Division and were joined by five American teams from the Eastern Conference. For 2020–21 the four Canadian teams competed in the newly formed North Division while the five remaining Pacific Division teams from the U.S., along with three American teams from the Central Division formed a re-constituted West Division. ![]() In 2005, following the lockout, the league changed the Western Conference logo (along with the Eastern Conference and NHL logos) to its current form.Īlong with the Eastern Conference, the Western Conference was temporarily abolished for the 2020–21 NHL season after the COVID-19 pandemic forced a realignment of the League to preclude the need for teams to regularly cross the Canada–United States border. Campbell Bowl, retains some connection to the heritage of the league. However, the trophy awarded to the conference champion, the Clarence S. Then-new NHL commissioner Gary Bettman made the change to help non-hockey fans better understand the game, as the National Basketball Association, National Football League, and Major League Baseball all use geographic-based names for their conferences and divisions. The names of conferences and divisions were changed in 1993 to reflect their geographic locations. The conferences and divisions were re-aligned in 1981 to better reflect the geographical locations of the teams, but the existing names were retained with the Campbell Conference becoming the conference for the NHL's westernmost teams. Because the new conferences and divisions had little to do with North American geography, geographical references were removed. Originally named the Clarence Campbell Conference (or Campbell Conference for short), it was created in 1974 when the NHL realigned its teams into two conferences and four divisions.
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