Report: NHL could schedule daily tripleheaders if season resumes

The NHL could have its teams play daily tripleheaders in an attempt to accelerate the season upon its possible return.

"I was always told to prepare for tripleheaders - that that's the kind of thing we would be looking at, tripleheaders on a daily basis," Sportsnet's Elliotte Friedman said Thursday on NHL Network.

He added: "I've been told that as it stands right now, the last possible day of the Stanley Cup Final is Oct. 5. So you can pretty much do the math, that's something like 66 days (from the end of July.)"

Friedman added that timing multiple games a day at the same rink may be complicated, especially if both hub cities are on the west coast.

It isn't yet known how the league will sanitize everything between games. Other potential hurdles include extended overtimes delaying other games.

"If we do go two western cities, that's going to be very interesting for TV how they do that," Friedman said. "In theory, you can play at 1:00, 4:00, and 7:00 every day locally, which is 4:00, 7:00, and 10:00 ET. But these are playoff games, what if we go to overtime? We talked about the cleaning that needs to be done between games, maybe that's not long enough a time between games.

"I was told to expect tripleheaders, I don't have any reason to believe that's different, but I'm not sure how much time they need in between all of these particular games."

The league is expected to initiate Phase 3 of its return-to-play plan on July 10, which would allow teams to begin full training camps. There is no date set yet for when the 24-team playoff will kick off.

Copyright (C) 2020 Score Media Ventures Inc. All rights reserved. Certain content reproduced under license.