Sunday, January 6, 2013

NHL lockout ends - tentative agreement reached

The National Hockey League (NHL) and the National Hockey League Players' Assoctiation (NHLPA) finally came to terms on a tentative Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) in a hotel in New York, N.Y., during the early morning hours on Sunday.

According to announcements made by both sides, the agreement was reached at 4:40 a.m. and announced to media at 5:30 a.m. on Sunday morning and would still need to be voted upon by the respective NHL Board of Governors and membership of the NHLPA.

Call it a formality at this point after team management, players, fans and everyone related to the business that is NHL hockey endured a 113-day lockout imposed by NHL owners after the previous CBA expired on Sept. 15, before getting to this point.

For the non-believers, seeing NHL commissioner Gary Bettman and NHLPA Executive Director standing side-by-side to make the announcement is proof that the reality of an NHL season being played this year is true.


 NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman & NHLPA Executive Director Donal Fehr - NHL.com

"Don Fehr and I are here to tell you that we have reached an agreement on the framework of a new Collective Bargaining Agreement, the details of which need to be put to paper," Bettman said.

"We have to dot a lot of I's and cross a lot of T's. There is still a lot of work to be done, but the basic framework has been agreed upon. We have to go through a ratification process and the Board of Governors has to approve it from the League side and, obviously, the players have to approve it as well."

As all the details are released and sorted out, players will now prepare to begin a short training camp period - up to a week at most - before jumping right into competing for the Stanley Cup during what will be an intense 48-50-game season.

Drop the puck - NHL hockey is back!

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Full recap of Carolina Hurricanes Examiner coverage during the lockout on Examiner.com:


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