As first reported back in the April, the NLL will move to three divisions this coming season with the addition of Halifax and New York coming into the league. The league officially announced the new Monday morning.
With 13 teams this season, the NLL is splitting the former East Division into East and North, and keeping the West Division as it is with the same five teams as last season. Of the two new teams, Halifax will join the North Division and New York will join the East Division.
Here is how each division will look.
North: Buffalo, Halifax, Toronto, Rochester
East: Georgia, New England, New York, Philadelphia
West: Calgary, Colorado, San Diego, Saskatchewan, Vancouver
In addition to divisional realignment, the league has also announced a new schedule type and playoff format for the upcoming 2019-2020 season, as well. During the regular season each team will play the other 12 teams at least once in their 18-game schedule.
Every team in the West Division will face two divisional opponents twice and the other two division rivals three times, while facing each team in the North and East Divisions once. Teams in the North and East Divisions will play the other three teams in its division three times, while facing non-divisional opponents once during the season.
As far as playoffs go, the league is retaining the eight-team playoff formant and the top team in each division will receive top three seeds, based on their records and any tiebreakers. The three second-place teams in each of the three divisions will get the fourth through sixth seeds in the order of their records and tiebreakers. The seventh and eighth “wild card” seeds will be awarded to the next two best records from any division.
