A new Collective Bargaining Agreement means substantial changes in the NLL as the season has been extended and the playoff format revamped.
The 2014 season will consist of each team playing 18 regular season games rather than 16 but a more noticeable change will be seen during the playoff series.
In the old set-up, eight out of the nine teams in the league made the playoffs. The second place team and third place team in each division played each other and the first place teams in each division would play the fourth place team. But, since the western division has five teams and the eastern division has four teams, a crossover rule was put into effect. This meant that if the fifth place in the western division had a better record than the fourth place team in the eastern division, they would take the last playoff spot in the east and play the first place team in the east.
This setup brought about controversy within the NLL because many people thought that the teams being eliminated after one game was not a fair way to determine the team that played the best throughout the whole season. Coaches, players, and fans began to think that some teams that did not perform well throughout the entire NLL season were making it farther in the playoffs than their record proved they should have and teams that deserved to make it farther in the playoffs were being eliminated because of the one game playoff they were playing.
During the 2012 playoff season, Rochester and Edmonton surprised everyone when they made it all the way to the championship game. Both teams had a losing record by the end of the season (Rochester 7-9 and Edmonton 10-6) but when playoffs came around and they had barely squeaked by, each team stepped up their game, and fast. A similar situation took place in this past season when the Knighthawks, with an 8-8 record, made it to the championship game again and won it for the second year in a row. Statements were made by players and coaching staff of the Knighthawks that if you make the playoffs, it is like a clean slate, almost like a brand new season. So, does that go to say that it is fair that they made it as far as they did? Should playoff contention be based more off of the entire regular season statistics and not looked at as a clean slate for teams? Or does a team really bringing their “A” game to the playoffs matter more? This is why change was made: to see if a new set up would eliminate some controversy.
For the 2014 season, only three teams in each division (six total) will advance to the playoffs compared to the eight teams that made it in the old set-up and the cross over rule has been eliminated and Minnesota will now join the eastern division.
The first place team in each division will have a bye awarded to them for the first round of the playoffs while the second and third place teams in each division play a one-game playoff at the home of the second place team to determine who will continue on to play the first place team in the divisional final series of games.
The final playoff round will be a series of games that proceeds as follows: game one will be played at the home of the lower seeded team and game two at the home of the higher seeded team. Should one team win both games, they will win the series and continue to the championship game. If the two teams are tied (each team with one win) at the end of the two game series, there will be an intermission then they will play a ten minute game to determine the overall winner. If they are still tied at the end of the ten minute game, the teams will play a sudden death round to determine the winner. The winner of the second round will then play the in the championship game against the winner of the other division.
This new set-up will surely spice things up a bit and it seems like it will be a great change in the NLL. These changes will hopefully live up to their expectations, eliminate controversy, and take the NLL to a new level.
