The National Hockey League followed the NBA's lead when the COVID-19 pandemic struck America. The NHL and NBA schedules have always closely mirrored one another, in that they both begin around Late October and end around early June. It is thus no surprise that when the NBA shut down in March, they too shut down almost at the exact same time.

The NHL also had a bubble, however their's was vastly different than the NBA's. Instead of one large bubble in Orlando, Florida, the NHL had two different bubbles, located in Edmonton and Toronto, Canada respectively. Eastern conference teams would play in Toronto, while Western Conference teams would play in Edmonton. The Conference Finals and The Stanley Cup Finals, the last two rounds of the NHL playoffs, were located in Edmonton. The reason why the NHL decided to have two bubbles instead of one is because an average NHL roster is much larger than an average NBA roster. A typical NBA roster containins about 15 players, while a typical NHL roster contains 23. The NHL bubbles had similar protocols and punishments, in regards to leaving and entering, as the NBA's bubble in Orlando. 

The NHL invited 24 out of 31 teams into their bubbles. 12 Eastern Conference teams and 12 Western Conference teams would compete in each bubble. Unlike the NBA's relatively straightforward regular season and playoffs, the NHL decided to implement a complicated plan for their bubble games. Essentially, the teams were broken down into two groups, the top four teams in the both conference (8 teams) and the bottom 16 teams. The bottom 16 teams would compete against one other team in the group, determined by their record at the time of the league's postponement, in a best of 5 playoff qualifier series. The top four teams in each conference automatically entered the playoffs, however, they had to compete against the rest of the top four teams in their conference to determine which of the surviving 8 bottom 16 teams they would face in the playoffs. After everything was over, the Tampa Bay Lighting had claimed their 2nd Stanley Cup Championship after defeating the Dallas Stars. 

Like the NBA, the NHL bubble was a success. The bubble format, as devised by the NHL and NBA, appears to be the safest way to conduct games during the COVID-19 pandemic. During the NBA's and NHL's seasons, not one player who was in the bubbles caught COVID-19. Thus, not a single game was cancelled by either the NHL or NBA throughout their entire bubble run. This model, while safe, is ultimately unsustainable for a full season for either league. As I previously mentioned, the NBA's and NHL's seasons last from late October to early June. No player, in either league, would agree to be separated from their families and friends for that long. Both leagues will have games in regular arenas (with players in some sort of hybrid bubble) during their next seasons.

When the NHL found out that the NBA was going to include Black Lives Matter imagery on their telecasts, they decided that they would follow their lead, to a lesser extent. While the NBA put BLM at the front and center of their product, the NHL would casually showcase it in the background. Instead of directly saying the words "Black Lives Matter," the NHL would make vague allusions to it, saying things like "End Racism." Many fans who noticed this language, called the NHL out over this on twitter. The reason for this difference is most likely because unlike the NBA, the NHL is a majority Caucasian league, with many of its players not being from North America at all. The NHL players, while a progressive group as a whole, never pressured the NHL to put BLM imagery into their product before the restart. The NHL only included BLM imagery at all because they felt a sense of peer pressure from the NBA to do so.

The NHL's reluctance would largely change after the NHL players walked out of the playoffs. Following their NBA brothers in solidarity, every NHL player walked out of the playoffs due to the shooting of Jacob Blake. They too eventually agreed to return to play after NHL owners agreed to a list of their demands. On the first game back from the walkout, the words "Black Lives Matter" were blared through the speakers of the Scotiabank Arena. The NHL players had forced the NHL's hand, BLM would now be front in center of every NHL broadcast.