Jordan Martinook confirms Hurricanes voted against 24-team format

Jordan Martinook confirmed on Monday that he voted against the NHL's 24-team playoff format last week. The other team that had voted against it was the Tampa Bay Lightning.

Speaking with Chip Alexander of the Raleigh News & Observer, Martinook explained that, as the team's player representative on the NHL Players' Association's executive board, he voted against the proposal.

“I feel like if you're doing the 24-team thing, it basically gives a team a chance that had no chance of making it, which if you play 82 there's maybe 6, 8% chance that the team in 12th place (in the conference) makes it,” Martinook said. “Nobody's ever seen this before, but at the end of the day, the Stanley Cup Playoffs are 16 teams, seven games a series.”

Prior to the NHL pause on March 12th due to the coronavirus, the Hurricanes were sitting in the top wild card spot in the Eastern Conference. With this new league proposal, they would now be facing the New York Rangers who sat two points shy of the final wild card spot prior to the pause.

The executive board ended up voting Friday to authorize further negotiations with the NHL on the proposed 24-team format so that the Stanley Cup can be rewarded in 2020. However, several details still remain to be negotiated, and an agreement on the format would “still be subject to the parties reaching agreement on all issues relevant to resuming play,” according to a statement released by the NHLPA.

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