As the NHL playoff season continues, many people are confused about the format and how the playoffs work. Each game begins in a best-of-7, first to 4 wins. The format is a set bracket that is largely division-based with wild cards. The top three teams in each division will make up the first 12 teams in the playoffs. The remaining four spots will be filled by the next two highest-placed finishers in each conference, based on regular-season record and regardless of division. One division in each conference can send five teams to the postseason while the other sends just three.
In the first and second rounds, the division winner with the best record in each conference will be matched against the wild-card team with the lesser record. The wild card team with the better record will play the other division winner. The teams finishing second and third in each division will meet within the bracket headed by their respective division winners. The Second Round, First-round winners within each bracket play one another to determine the four participants in the Conference Finals.
In the Conference Finals and Stanley Cup Final, home-ice advantage goes to the team that had the better regular-season record, regardless of the teams’ final standing in their respective divisions. These games are for the biggest prize in hockey, the Stanley Cup. The Stanley Cup is the oldest trophy in North American professional sports, first awarded in 1893 after being donated by Lord Stanley of Preston, the Governor General of Canada. After the win, the team has its moment with the cup. Unlike most sports trophies, there’s only one “real” Cup that gets passed from team to team, with players’ names engraved on it each year, so many that older rings are eventually removed and preserved.