1993–94 NHL season

For this season, the names of the conferences were changed from Campbell and Wales to Western and Eastern respectively, and the divisions' names were changed from Adams, Patrick, Norris, and Smythe to Northeast, Atlantic, Central, and Pacific respectively.[4] Each division had changes. The Northeast Division would welcome the Pittsburgh Penguins, previously from the Patrick Division. The Atlantic Division would welcome the newcomer Florida Panthers and the Tampa Bay Lightning, previously from the Norris Division. The Central Division would welcome the Winnipeg Jets, previously from the Smythe Division. The Pacific Division would welcome the newcomer Mighty Ducks of Anaheim. New league commissioner Gary Bettman, who had previously worked in the National Basketball Association (NBA), thought the old names could be confusing to non-traditional fans and believed that a change to geographically-named divisions, as used in the NBA and most other North American professional sports, would be more easily understandable to new fans.

In addition, the playoff format was changed to a conference based seeding over division specific brackets: the division winners were seeded one-two by order of point finish, then the top six remaining teams in the conference were seeded three through eight.[4] However, unlike the NBA, the NHL matched the highest-seeded winners against the lowest-seeded winners in the second round. In order to reduce the number of long trips to and from the West Coast, whenever a Central Division team played a Pacific Division team in the playoffs, the format was 2–3–2 rather than the traditional 2–2–1–1–1, a format that was only used for the 1993–94 season.

The Panthers and Mighty Ducks set new records for first-year expansion teams. Both teams finished with 33 wins, surpassing the 31 wins of the Philadelphia Flyers and Los Angeles Kings in 1967–68. That mark would not be topped by another expansion team until the Vegas Golden Knights notched their 34th win in their inaugural season on February 1, 2018, finishing with 51 wins.[5] The Panthers also set a high-water mark in points, with 83 points, surpassing the previous record set by the Flyers' 73 points in 1967–68. The Golden Knights would eventually shatter this inaugural expansion team record by 26 points notching a total of 109 points in 2017–18.

The division first-place finishers qualify for the playoffs as 1-2 seeding. The next six per conference are the teams with the six best records of the non-division winners.

For the first time, all four former WHA teams (Edmonton, Hartford, Quebec, and Winnipeg) failed to make the playoffs in the same season.

The NHL awards presentation took place on June 16, 1994.

Trading deadline: March 21, 1994.[9]

• March 19, 1994: Donald Dufresne traded from Tampa Bay to Los Angeles for Los Angeles's sixth round pick in 1994 Entry Draft.
• March 19, 1994: Jeff Daniels traded from Pittsburgh to Florida for Greg Hawgood.
• March 19, 1994: Doug Zmolek and Mike Lalor traded from San Jose to Dallas for Ulf Dahlen.
• March 21, 1994: Joe Juneau traded from Boston to Washington for Al Iafrate.
• March 21, 1994: Craig Janney traded from Vancouver to St. Louis for Jeff Brown, Bret Hedican and Nathan Lafayette.
• March 21, 1994: Jim Johnson traded from Dallas to Washington for Alan May and Washington's seventh round pick in 1995 Entry Draft.
• March 21, 1994: Joe Reekie traded from Tampa Bay to Washington for Enrico Ciccone and Washington's third round pick in 1994 Entry Draft and a conditional draft pick.
• March 21, 1994: Steve Konroyd traded from Detroit to Ottawa for Daniel Berthiaume.
• March 21, 1994: Phil Bourque traded from NY Rangers to Ottawa for future considerations.
• March 21, 1994: Tony Amonte and the rights to Matt Oates traded from NY Rangers to Chicago for Stephane Matteau and Brian Noonan.
• March 21, 1994: Peter Andersson traded from NY Rangers to Florida for future considerations.
• March 21, 1994: Robert Dirk traded from Vancouver to Chicago for Chicago's fourth round pick in 1994 Entry Draft.
• March 21, 1994: Mike Gartner traded from NY Rangers to Toronto for Glenn Anderson, the rights to Scott Malone and Toronto's fourth round pick in 1994 Entry Draft.
• March 21, 1994: Craig MacTavish traded from Edmonton to NY Rangers for Todd Marchant.
• March 21, 1994: Paul Ysebaert traded from Winnipeg to Chicago for Chicago's third round pick in 1995 Entry Draft.
• March 21, 1994: Alexei Kasatonov traded from Anaheim to St. Louis for Maxim Bets and St. Louis' sixth round pick in 1995 Entry Draft.
• March 21, 1994: Mike Needham traded from Pittsburgh to Dallas for Jim McKenzie.
• March 21, 1994: Kevin Todd traded from Chicago to Los Angeles for Los Angeles's fourth round pick in the 1994 Entry Draft.
• March 21, 1994: Pelle Eklund traded from Philadelphia to Dallas for future considerations.
• March 21, 1994: Roy Mitchell and Reid Simpson traded from Dallas to New Jersey for future considerations.
• March 21, 1994: Steve Passmore traded from Quebec to Edmonton for Brad Werenka.

As a part of the 1992 strike settlement, the NHL and Bruce McNall's Multivision Marketing and Public Relations Co. organized 26 regular season games in cities without a franchise as a litmus test for future expansion.

The Stars played a neutral-site game in their previous market of Minnesota at the Target Center in Minneapolis, where they were greeted enthusiastically. The Minnesota North Stars' tradition of playing on New Year's Eve and holding a post-game skate on the ice was also continued with a game between the Flyers and Bruins.

The Lightning vs. Red Wings contest in Minneapolis was scheduled for Martin Luther King Day, a Monday, necessitating an afternoon face-off at 2:05 PM. However, due to an error on the NHL's part, the Lightning believed themselves to be playing at 7:35 PM, an error that was only discovered two weeks prior to the game by reporters. The Lightning ended up playing an 8:05 PM game in Winnipeg, flying back to the U.S., and playing again 18 hours later in Minneapolis.

The Panthers, in the midst of a playoff race, played a March "home" game against the Maple Leafs 30 miles from Toronto, at Hamilton.

• List of Stanley Cup champions
• 1993 NHL Entry Draft
• 1993 NHL Expansion Draft
• 1993 NHL Supplemental Draft
• 45th National Hockey League All-Star Game
• National Hockey League All-Star Game
• NHL All-Rookie Team
• Ice hockey at the 1994 Winter Olympics
• 1993 in sports
• 1994 in sports

• Diamond, Dan, ed. (2000). Total Hockey. Kingston, NY: Total Sports. ISBN 1-892129-85-X.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
• Dinger, Ralph, ed. (2011). The National Hockey League Official Guide & Record Book 2012. Toronto, ON: Dan Diamond & Associates. ISBN 978-1-894801-22-5.
• Dryden, Steve, ed. (2000). Century of hockey. Toronto, ON: McClelland & Stewart Ltd. ISBN 0-7710-4179-9.
• Fischler, Stan; Fischler, Shirley; Hughes, Morgan; Romain, Joseph; Duplacey, James (2003). The Hockey Chronicle: Year-by-Year History of the National Hockey League. Lincolnwood, IL: Publications International Inc. ISBN 0-7853-9624-1.

Notes

• Hockey Database 1994 season