NHL's 32nd Team Approved: Seattle

It wasn't very long ago when we were talking about the excitement surrounding the expansion approval for Las Vegas and now we're here again, after Tuesday's announcement that Seattle has been granted an expansion team into the NHL, bringing the total number of teams to 32, starting play in the 2021-2022 season.

Yes, it's a fair ways away, but we all know how fast time is flying these days and before too long, we'll be talking frantically about another expansion draft and free agency and how it all applies to the new team in the Pacific Northwest, but we'll save that for then.

The team is still in need of some renovations to their building, Key Arena, which is why they are so far out from starting their NHL existence, but once the summer of 2021 rolls around, we will be waist deep in Seattle euphoria, as it sounds like they will hold the expansion draft at Key Arena and then they'll be off to the races.

Like the Golden Knights last season, the addition of another NHL team means that the hockey pool will have another couple of goalies to pull from, so if the draft ever goes beyond 25 teams again, we will have plenty of goaltending to pick from and we can continue on the same format of eight forwards, four defensemen and a pair of goalies.  The formula has worked so well for this long, just wait until the hockey pool expands!