(ATR) National Hockey League commissioner Gary Bettman and franchise owners have steadfastly asserted that it is no longer in their best interest to halt the season and participate at the PyeongChang 2018 Games.
International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach is meeting with Bettman in New York on Friday seeking solutions to the current stalemate between the NHL and IOC. International Ice Hockey Federation president Rene Fasel and NHL Players Association executive director Donald Fehr will also attend the meeting at the league offices.
The meeting marks the first time that the parties will meet face-to-face in a dispute hinging on the IOC’s unwillingness to pay out of pocket transportation and insurance costs for the elite North American hockey league players as it has done for the previous five Olympics.
"We are in New York for a number of meetings," said IOC spokesperson Mark Adams. "Whilst here we will also be making a courtesy visit to the NHL."
Adding a twist to the negotiations, Washington Capitals owner Ted Leonsis has stated that he will let players go to the Olympics in Korea, including Russian star Alex Ovechkin, regardless of the outcome. Other players or teams could follow.
Players and Olympic stakeholders have expressed a strong sentiment for the NHL and Olympic partnership to continue.
"Our main goal is to grow the game worldwide," Vancouver Canucks NHL Players Association representative Alex Burrows told the Theprovince.com at the recent All-Star Game in Los Angeles.
"We feel the Asian market is appealing to us," he said. "We have the Olympics in PyeongChang and Beijing so the timing would be right to go over there and test the waters. For some reason the league is reluctant to go to the Olympics in 2018."
"Certainly I think big-picture there's obviously a lot of challenges to it," New York Islanders forward John Tavares, whose first Olympics in 2014 were cut short by injury, told Canada Sportsnet.
"But at the end of the day I think we as players love representing our countries and best-on-best hockey doesn't happen very often."
European NOCs Weigh In
In Europe, National Olympic Committee leaders from elite hockey nations also hope the NHL Olympic partnership continues.
No country more so than Finland, which has medaled at four of the five Olympics in which the NHL has participated.
"We would like, of course, to see the best athletes compete in the Olympics," Finland NOC High Performance director Miko Kojonkoski told Around the Rings. "It is very important for the Olympic Games, for the sport and also for us as a nation.
"We believe and hope a positive solution will be found," he said. "The second option would be much worse, but we are able to live with that too."
Czech NOC president Jiri Kejval said that fans in his hockey-crazed country, which won gold at Nagano 1998, one of the country’s defining sporting achievements, will watch Olympic hockey no matter what.
"For us, Europeans, the Olympic tournament is by far the biggest and most important ice hockey event," Kejval tells ATR. "I am convinced that Czech fans are going to enjoy it and follow it regardless of who puts the national hockey jersey on.
"I don’t think the Olympic tournament itself would suffer major damage if the NHL players didn’t participate. However, their absence would first and foremost harm the development of ice hockey."
During this past weekend’s All-Star game festivities in Los Angeles, NHL deputy commissioner Bill Daly said: "If the status quo remains, I don't expect us to be in the Olympics."
Despite a January deadline that has passed, history dictates that there is still time for a resolution. The NHL did not formally agree to participate in the 2006 Turin Olympics until the summer leading up to the Games because of the 2004-05 lockout. It was a similar case for the Sochi 2014 Olympics.
Bettman, Fasel, former IOC president Juan Antonio Samaranch and former NHLPA executive director Bob Goodenow met in Geneva, Switzerland in March 1995, to reach the initial agreement for the league’s top players to compete at the Olympics, starting at the 1998 Nagano Games.
Now, more than 20 years later, the league’s participation at the Olympics appears to be on thin ice.
Written by Brian Pinelli
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