New division realignment could hurt one of the NHL's best rivalries

COVID-19 has affected just about anything you can think of, and its next victim may be one of the best rivalries in the league today. The NHL has to come up with a way it can realign the divisions in order to play this season, but the proposed divisions look a lot different than they do right now.

In order to cut down on travel for every team in the league, the 4 divisions would be:

Canadian Division: Flames, Oilers, Canadiens, Senators, Maple Leafs, Canucks, Jets

East Division: Bruins, Sabres, Hurricanes, Devils, Islanders, Rangers, Flyers, Capitals

Central Division: Blackhawks, Blue Jackets, Red Wings, Panthers, Predators, Penguins, Blues, Lightning

West Division: Ducks, Coyotes, Avalanche, Stars, Kings, Wild, Sharks, Golden Knights

The rivalry that would be disrupted in this realignment is none other than the Pittsburgh Penguins and Philadelphia Flyers. It is almost unthinkable that the two teams would be in separate divisions, as they have one of the most heated rivalries in the NHL. To go along with this, Sidney Crosby and Claude Giroux are both over 30 years of age, so there are not a ton of meetings left between the two.

It is understandable that the league wants to play the season as safely as possible, but is splitting up the Flyers and Penguins the best decision? One thing that could maybe change would be to send the Hurricanes to the Central division and then put the Penguins in the East division.

All hockey fans can hope for at this point is that there is an NHL season this year, and hopefully the league gets the divisions right without taking away too many rivalries.

Source: Yahoo sports

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