NHL News: Phase 2, Kotkaniemi, Draft Lottery, Hub Cities, World Junior Championship
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Phase 2 for Hurricanes about to start … Most Flames will be in Calgary early this week

Hurricanes PR: The Carolina Hurricanes will open their facilities on Tuesday for Phase 2. 16 players plan on being part of two groups that will take to the ice on Tuesday.

TSN: The Calgary Flames have 18 players in town already according to GM Brad Treliving. He added that he expects the remainder to arrive early this week.

Kotkaniemi healthy and ready to go

Arpon Basu: Montreal Canadiens forward Jesperi Kotkaniemi is healthy and ready to play. He will fly to Montreal sometime this week.

Draft lottery notes if the play-in round isn’t completed

Elliotte Friedman: If the NHL needs to shut down and the play-in rounds are not completed, the bottom eight teams would have a one in eight shot at winning the draft lottery.

Monday at the earliest for a Hub city announcement

TSN: NHL Deputy commission Bill Daley when asked by Ryan Rishaug if the higher COVID numbers in the United States are causing them to re-evaluate Las Vegas or one of the other U.S. cities as a Hub.

“Every relevant consideration will be fairly evaluated before decisions are made and announced.”

Pierre LeBrun said that his sources are saying announcing a hub city would be Monday at the earliest.

Phase 3 for training camps is still expected to get underway on July 10th.

A decision on the World Juniors won’t come until August  

TSN: Bob McKenzie said that Hockey Canada and the IIHF don’t need to make a final decision about the World Junior Championships until late August.

“Now they are game-planning for every possibility and that includes Edmonton and Red Deer hosting to full houses as per normal. But they’ve also got schemes where they could be looking at 75 or 50 or 25 per cent attendance or even right down to zero perhaps for Edmonton and Red Deer. But another one they’re also keeping as a Plan B or C or D whatever you want to call it, is that this could be shifted to the Hockey Canada WinSport facility in Calgary if it is played before zero fans, and that’s an option as well.”