From the Rafters: The No. 3 Seed—an NHL Rule That SHOULD Be Re-Visited

A quick pass through the final standings this year shows that a mere four teams in the league this year had sub-.500 winning percentages at home. And due to the rules on how the seeding works, there is no re-seeding after each round. So Washington will stay as a No. 3 seed until their last game of the season.

Backtracking a bit, here’s a brief history lesson. One might ask, why did we go ahead with this change in seeding in the first place?

To answer that question, we start by thinking back to the '90s when we were in expansion mode and handing out teams to Ottawa, Florida, San Jose, Atlanta, Nashville, Tampa, and Anaheim. Given all of these additions along with the anticipated entry of Columbus and Minnesota in 2000, in 1998-99 the NHL decided to complete a re-alignment of the divisions to prepare for a league with 30 teams, it’s highest since inception.

Gone were the Adams, Smythe, Patrick, and Norris divisions. In their place stood the newly coined Northeast, Atlantic, Southeast, Central, Pacific, and Northwest divisions, each with five teams.

Reason one for the change in seeding? Location, location, location. The NHL has for years been concerned about ensuring the game is shoved down the throat of the average American, who seems lukewarm at best in terms of his love for hockey.

The last thing Gary Bettman wants to do is have teams like Florida, Tampa Bay, and Los Angeles go multiple years without participating in the playoffs and specifically, without being host to multiple home games.

Home games not only generate revenue to the local team, but it creates a buzz. That same buzz is what puts people in the seats, and what brings them back to the box office for more. The league wants to ensure the largest footprint possible and they belief that this is certainly one way to help achieve that goal.

The second major reason why this change occurred had to do with the uneven distribution of wealth and power in the league (pre-salary cap).

Before the cap, one could eyeball each of the six divisions and at least in one case (I am pointing squarely at the Southwest division), it’s highly possible that in any given year, none of those five teams would finish in the top eight. This would prevent anyone from that division being represented in the Stanley Cup Playoffs.

The seeding arrangement ensures that at least one of those teams would make it every year. This resembles the handling of the NHL All Star game and their approach to ensuring one player from each NHL team participates.

Some speculate that a third input into the decision to allocate the No. 3 seed in such a fashion is to somehow compensate for some of the other divisions, such as the Atlantic and Northwest. These divisions have the notorious reputation of playing some real grueling and tough conference games throughout the year. Think of the NY Rangers vs New Jersey and Calgary vs Edmonton contests are prime examples.

The game between those two rivals are beyond intense and can often resemble a train wreck. At times the series often ends up being a split but the battle scars are deep. Split series equal lower total point totals at end of year, and as such, the No. 3 seed may help one of those teams to be artificially propped up a little.

In reality, the helping hand may simply be putting them exactly where they belong given the potential to win or lose against out of conference teams. I digress…

As much as I can understand what arguments may have been used to support this No. 3 seed concept, I just don’t buy it. Call me a capitalist or a purist, but I just think it’s yet another little voodoo tweak to the way the game was both scored and played for some 90 years without any tampering.

With the salary cap a thing of the present, the board is much more artificially level thus the argument once used here is a thing of the past. I think if you want to finish third, be the team that statistically has the third most points come game 82.

The only thing that’s good with the No. 3 seed rule is the drama comes game 80 through end of season. It makes for great flowcharts and “if this team beats this team, and the other team goes into OT, the 3 seed then belongs to team X…. BUT…”

I confess, it’s fun to watch all the variations and permutations that the poor moderately skilled labour on the sports shows have to plod through. Given the alternative, however, I'll take good old straight math and hard fought games from bell to bell. Whoever finishes in the third spot stays in third spot. Period.

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