- Keep Current Format
- 1-8 Seeding
- Expand the number of teams in the playoffs
- Play in tournament

Any other ideas?

They should do a tournament like the play-in but

Top 3 make the playoffs without the need for 3rd place having to play, add 2 WC spots which allows for a mini playin tournament for a chance to be in the playoffs

WC1 plays WC4, WC2 Plays WC3 then in the end you got 2 teams who made it via WC Play-In which not only barely changes the current format but also helps the league generate more money

So lets say Philly, Columbus, Boston, and Pittsburgh are the WC for Metro and Atlantic you get a mini tournament of Philly vs. Pittsburgh and Columbus vs. Boston and for the playin we keep the same format best of 5. But once we have our winners everything goes back to normal (best of 7) for rounds 1-finals

It’s late, this could be bad ideas 😂

- have two wild card games between 8 and 9 seeds from each conference to see who gets the final playoff spot.

- no Eastern or Western conference, top 16 teams overall make the playoffs

- expand to 24 teams, first round is best of 3 first round, 1 road 1 away game, final game if necessary back at highest seed arena. Best of 7 after that

This could work to

I was thinking of a mini wildcard tournament

Where 4 teams make it for Atlantic/Metro and 4 teams make it for Pacific/Central

WC 1 plays WC 4 and WC 2 Plays WC 3 winners of each are the teams who make the playoffs in the WC spots. Whoever wins first gets WC 1 for the playoffs and whoever finished second gets the remaining WC spot

That way we can keep the current format while getting some extra games in and to quicken things for the WC tournament its a best of 5 and not 7

Do the top 3 teams get a "bye" or do they play in a round robin tournament to decide the seeding?
But I like this idea

I had the same idea for the 1st one
I don't really like the second idea
The 3rd idea is crazy, but it can be even crazier if the remaining 8 teams that miss the playoffs play in a single-elimination draft lottery tournament

Top 3 make it is the safest decision due to travel and home ice factors that could make a round robin feel one sided for the home team.

I think 1v8 will always be the best format for playoffs, 1v16 makes no sense and what we have with divisions now isn’t great either

I like 1-8 seeding the most. Though I prefer current format over any type of play-in, which would severely impact interest importance of the regular season.
Also, regular season shouldn't be 82 games, think the players would greatly benefit from smthn like two weeks longer off-season and roughly six games less for regular season.

I'm a purist, so I'm biased, but I pretty much like everything the way it is now. 8 should definitely stay as the max number of teams that qualify (it's the top half of each conference, most of the time, no team below that deserves to be in), I could hear an argument for 1-8 seeding (because it makes sense that the team with the better record should get home ice), but I like the in-division rivalries that get created by the current format.