Commissioner Gary Bettman last month announced the steps the league and the NHL Players’ Association agreed upon to move forward, including the official ending of the 2019-20 season, a 24-team return-to-play format and how the draft lottery will look.

Translation? There’s still a lot to be ironed out — and, it needs to be noted, nothing is guaranteed due to the COVID-19 pandemic — but one thing appears to be more and more likely: a 2020 Stanley Cup champion will be crowned.

“I want to make clear that the health and safety of our players, coaches, essential support staff, our communities are paramount,” Bettman said during the reveal of the format May 26. “While nothing is without risk, ensuring health and safety has been central to all of our planning so far and will remain so. Let me assure you that the reason we are doing this is because our fans are telling us in overwhelming numbers that they want us to complete the season, if at all possible, and our players and our teams are clear that they want to play and bring the season to its rightful conclusion.”

When it’ll happen is still in flux because of such things as location, COVID-19 testing and mandatory 14-day quarantines to anyone entering Canada.

MORE: NHL’s Phase 2 details

Phase 2 of the NHL’s return plan began June 8, with Phase 3 and training camps tentatively slated to start on July 10.

Here’s everything we know so far about the NHL’s potential return to the ice in Phase 4:

Is the 2019-20 season over?

Yes. Bettman announced the 2019-20 season has officially concluded.

With that information, the Boston Bruins are the 2019-20 Presidents’ Trophy winners (100 points), backstopped by their William M. Jennings Trophy winners Tuukka Rask and Jaroslav Halak.

The Edmonton Oilers’ Leon Draisaitl captures his first Art Ross Trophy with 110 points and Alex Ovechkin and David Pastrnak finish the season with 48 goals each to split the Rocket Richard Trophy. Ovechkin, who notched his 700th goal this season, now has nine goal-scoring titles to his name.

MORE ON: Rocket Richard Trophy | Art Ross Trophy | 2019-20 season

How many teams will return to play?

As reported by Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman on May 20, the league, the players and the Return to Play Committee have agreed on a 24-team format.

The top 24 teams based on points percentage — teams had not all played the same number of games when the season was paused on March 12 — are seeded 1-12 in each conference. Seven teams will not resume play and will automatically enter the draft lottery.

Eastern Conference

Western Conference

Teams that will not return

How would the playoffs work?

Here’s what we know:

There will be normal conference playoffs, meaning Eastern Conference teams will play Eastern Conference teams and Western Conference teams will play Western Conference teams. Before those take place, however, there will be a “Qualifying Round” to set the playoff field. 

Round-robin for top-four teams

The top four seeds in each conference will receive byes from the Qualifying Round and will play a round-robin for seeding purposes for the usual first round of the playoffs (16 teams). If these games go to overtime, then they’ll be played under regular-season overtime rules. If there is a tie in points at the conclusion of the round-robin, percentage points from the regular season will be used as a tiebreaker.

Eastern Conference

Western Conference

Qualifying Round

The teams seeded 5-12 will face off in this round. These series will be best-of-five matchups and will feature the usual playoff overtime rule of play until someone scores. Winners of these series will then meet the top four teams in a still-to-be-determined setting.

Eastern Conference opening-round series

Western Conference opening-round series

2020 Stanley Cup playoffs

Once the teams are whittled down to 16, it will be the Stanley Cup playoffs. Bettman told ESPN on June 15 that each round will be best of seven.

Where will the games be held?

“Hub cities” has been the magic phrase in sports, and the NHL is looking to play in two locations. Bettman said last month that 10 teams were in the running to serve as hub cities.

  • The Kings’ season has officially ended.

“The reason there are so many cities still in contention is we didn’t want to be in a situation with things in the world moving so quickly, changing from day to day, we didn’t want to get locked in,” Bettman told NBCSN’s Mike Tirico on May 26, noting a decision was, at minimum, three weeks away. “We don’t want to go to a place where there’s a lot of COVID-19. We don’t want to go to a place where we can’t get the testing we need, there’s going to be extensive testing . . . and there are governmental issues,” he said. 

“For example, currently, we don’t think we can do this in the Canadian markets because there’s a 14-day quarantine . . . if we get done with training camp and we want to go to a Canadian city, and to do that we have to quarantine a team for another 14 days, that isn’t going to work.”

Bettman told ESPN’s Mike Greenberg on June 15 that he is still in discussions with Canadian government officials about the length of the quarantine from the end of training camp to the start of the Qualifying Round. 

Will fans be able to attend?

Bettman didn’t address this on May 26, but probably not. The league has looked into it but the complications are massive. 

Will players be tested for COVID-19?

Players will be tested daily, deputy commissioner Bill Daly said.

“We will have a rigorous daily testing protocol where players are tested every evening and those results are obtained before they would leave their hotel rooms the next morning, so we’ll know if we have a positive test and whether the player has to self-quarantine himself as a result of that positive test,” Daly said in a Zoom call on May 26. “It’s expensive, but we think it’s really a foundational element of what we’re trying to accomplish.”

Bettman said that each test will cost around $125 with an estimated 25,000 to 35,000 tests needed for the entire playoffs, according to The Associated Press.

Bettman told Greenberg that a person who tests positive “will be isolated” and that people who were “in close proximity” would be monitored through contact tracing.

“Obviously, for any sport, if you have a major outbreak, it’s going to change everything; but we’re being told that an isolated case or a couple of isolated cases shouldn’t interfere with the plans, and we should be able to move forward,” Bettman said.