1992–93 NHL season


The 1992–93 NHL season was the 76th regular season of the National Hockey League. Each player wore a patch on their jersey throughout the season to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Stanley Cup. The league expanded to 24 teams with the addition of the Ottawa Senators and the Tampa Bay Lightning.
The Montreal Canadiens won their league-leading 24th Cup by defeating the Los Angeles Kings four games to one. This remains the last time that a Canadian team has won the Stanley Cup.
It proved, at the time, to be the highest-scoring regular season in NHL history, as a total of 7,311 goals were scored over 1,008 games for an average of 7.25 per game. Twenty of the twenty-four teams scored three goals or more per game, and only two teams, the Toronto Maple Leafs and the Chicago Blackhawks, allowed fewer than three goals per game. Only 68 shutouts were recorded during the regular season. A record twenty-one players reached the 100-point plateau, while a record fourteen players reached the 50-goal plateau—both records still stand as of the 2019–20 NHL season.

League business

This was the final season of the Wales and Campbell Conferences, and the Adams, Patrick, Norris, and Smythe divisions. Both the conferences and the divisions would be renamed to reflect geography rather than the league's history for the following season. This was also the last year in which the playoff structure bracketed and seeded teams by division; they would be bracketed and seeded by conference for 1993–94.
This season saw two new clubs join the league: the Ottawa Senators and the Tampa Bay Lightning. The Senators were the second Ottawa-based NHL franchise and brought professional hockey back to Canada's capital, while the Tampa Bay franchise strengthened the NHL's presence in the American Sun Belt, which had first started with the birth of the Los Angeles Kings in 1967.
This was also the final season of play for the Minnesota North Stars, before relocating to Dallas, Texas, the following season.
All teams wore a commemorative patch this year celebrating the 100th anniversary of the Stanley Cup.
Gil Stein was appointed NHL President in the summer of 1992, on an interim basis.
On February 1, 1993, Gary Bettman became the first NHL Commissioner. With the expiration of Gil Stein's tenure on July 1, 1993, the position of President was merged into the position of Commissioner.
On March 28, 1993, through a brokered deal with ESPN, ABC begins the first of a two year deal with the National Hockey League to televise six regional Sunday afternoon broadcasts. This marked the first time that regular season National Hockey League games were broadcast on American network television since .

Rule changes

of the Winnipeg Jets shattered the rookie scoring record by scoring 76 goals and 56 assists for 132 points this season. He was named the winner of the Calder Memorial Trophy as the NHL Rookie of the Year, and his goals and points marks remain the NHL rookie records.
The New York Rangers missed the playoffs. This marked the first time since the President's Trophy had been introduced that the previous season's top team missed the next year's playoffs.
For the first time in his NHL career, Wayne Gretzky did not finish in the top three in scoring. A back injury limited Gretzky to 45 games in which he scored 65 points.
The Pittsburgh Penguins set a new NHL record, winning 17 consecutive games. The streak ending with the regular season.

Final standings

Note: W = Wins, L = Losses, T = Ties, GF = Goals for, GA = Goals against, Pts = Points

Prince of Wales Conference

Clarence Campbell Conference

Playoffs

Playoff bracket

Stanley Cup Finals

NHL awards

All-Star teams

Player statistics

Scoring leaders

Leading goaltenders

Neutral-site games

As a part of the 1992 strike settlement, the NHL and Bruce McNall's Multivision Marketing and Public Relations Co. organized 24 regular season games in 15 cities that did not have a franchise, providing as a litmus test for future expansion. Four of the cities chosen - Phoenix, Atlanta, Dallas and Miami - were eventually the sites of expansion or relocations, and although neither Cleveland nor Cincinnati received NHL franchises, there would be one placed in Columbus, located halfway between the two cities.
Two arenas that hosted neutral-site games had hosted NHL teams before: Atlanta's The Omni and Cleveland's Richfield Coliseum.
DateWinning TeamScoreLosing TeamScoreOTCityState/ProvinceArenaAttendance
Calgary4Minnesota3SaskatoonSKSaskPlace
Toronto5Ottawa3HamiltonONCopps Coliseum
Washington4Chicago1IndianapolisINMarket Square Arena
Quebec3Toronto1HamiltonONCopps Coliseum
New Jersey3Buffalo2HamiltonONCopps Coliseum
Los Angeles6Chicago3MilwaukeeWIBradley Center
Montreal5Los Angeles5PhoenixAZArizona Veterans Memorial Coliseum
NY Rangers6Tampa Bay5MiamiFLMiami Arena
NY Islanders4Edmonton1Oklahoma CityOKMyriad Convention Center
NY Islanders4St. Louis3DallasTXReunion Arena
Montréal4San Jose1SacramentoCAARCO Arena
Winnipeg8Hartford7SaskatoonSKSaskPlace
Pittsburgh4Boston0AtlantaGAThe Omni
St. Louis3Hartford1PeoriaILCarver Arena
Calgary4Philadelphia4CincinnatiOHRiverfront Coliseum
Quebec5Tampa Bay2HalifaxNSHalifax Metro Centre
Detroit5Philadelphia5ClevelandOHRichfield Coliseum
NY Rangers4San Jose0SacramentoCAARCO Arena
Winnipeg8Ottawa2SaskatoonSKSaskPlace7,245
Vancouver5Buffalo2HamiltonONCopps Coliseum
Minnesota4Vancouver3SaskatoonSKSaskPlace
Washington4Detroit2MilwaukeeWIBradley Center
Boston3New Jersey1ProvidenceRIProvidence Civic Center
Pittsburgh6Edmonton4ClevelandOHRichfield Coliseum

The Hartford-St. Louis game was originally scheduled to be played on December 29, 1992, in Birmingham, Alabama.

Events and milestones

Regular season

Team
Team
* Equalled existing record

Debuts

The following is a list of players of note who played their first NHL game in 1992–93 :
The following is a list of players of note who played their last game in the NHL in 1992–93 :
Four of the five remaining helmetless players in the league played their final games: Carlyle, Marsh, Langway, and Wilson. The only remaining helmetless player was Craig McTavish who retired following the 1996–97 season.

Trading deadline

Trading deadline: March 22, 1993.

Prince of Wales Conference

Clarence Campbell Conference

Hat tricks