The NHL has officially announced that, amid rising cases of COVID-19 across the league, players will no longer be participating in February’s Winter Olympics in Beijing.
“The National Hockey League respects and admires the desire of NHL Players to represent their countries and participate in a ‘best on best’ tournament,” NHL commissioner Gary Bettman said in a statement. “Accordingly, we have waited as long as possible to make this decision while exploring every available option to enable our Players to participate in the 2022 Winter Olympic Games.
“Unfortunately, given the profound disruption to the NHL’s regular-season schedule caused by recent COVID-related events — 50 games already have been postponed through Dec. 23 — Olympic participation is no longer feasible.”
The announcement comes in the wake of the NHL deciding it would pause its season from Wednesday through Christmas Day due to COVID-19 concerns.
The NHL had until Jan. 10 to pull out of the games without financial penalty. The announcement means NHLers will not participate in the Winter Games for a second consecutive cycle after playing in five straight Games from 1998 to 2014.
“Since the CBA extension was reached 17 months ago, NHL players have looked forward with great anticipation to once again participating in the Winter Olympics,” Don Fehr, the NHLPA’s executive director, said in a statement. “Until very recently, we seemed to be on a clear path to go to Beijing.
“COVID-19 has unfortunately intervened, forcing dozens of games to be postponed this month alone. No matter how much we wish it were not the case, we need to utilize the Olympic period to reschedule these games.”
The NHL, NHLPA and International Ice Hockey Federation reached an agreement to send players to the Games in September. However, the agreement was always contingent on the role the pandemic played in the NHL season which — after a week of rising cases and postponements — became too much of a disruption for the league.
With the Olympics decision now behind it, the NHL will turn its focus to rescheduling the games postponed in recent weeks. While some of those games may be played during the three-week break the NHL allotted for the Olympics, other events booked into team arenas will present a challenge for the schedule makers.
