NHL and Gary Bettman Officially Cancel Longtime NHL Staple Event
Photo credit: Sportspro
The National Hockey League announced that it will be hosting an event at UBS Arena in February, though it won't be the originally scheduled All-Star Game.
The National Hockey League enjoyed unprecedented success with the 4 Nations Faceoff in February, which took place instead of the annual All-Star Game.
To try and seize on that momentum, NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman has announced that while the League will honor its reservation at UBS Arena this February, the event will instead be a "kickoff going to the Olympics".
We'll have an event at UBS before we go to the Olympics but then we'll do something that's more focused on a major hockey event for the following year. We have a little bit of time to finalize what we're doing.
UBS Arena in Elmont, New York, which opened in November 2021, is the home of the New York Islanders.
2026 will feature the return of NHL players to the Winter Olympic Games for the 1st time since the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics.
Per Bettman, the NHL will work in 2-year cycles thanks to the success of the 4 Nations Faceoff.
What we do in the intervening years, we're still thinking about. But we know we set the bar high, which should be a good thing.
We're in the process of finalizing the schedule and we are comfortable and confident that we will have an event that people will like as a kickoff to going to the Olympics. And then we'll come back and do a more hockey-focused competition event the following year.
The most recent NHL All-Star Game was played at Scotiabank Arena in February 2024.
| POLL | ||
AVRIL 29 | 229 ANSWERS NHL and Gary Bettman Officially Cancel Longtime NHL Staple Event Do you prefer this event rather than the traditional NHL All-Star Game? | ||
| Yes | 169 | 73.8 % |
| No | 60 | 26.2 % |
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