Seattle will be 32nd franchise

The NHL will soon have 32 teams if Seattle is approved as expected next week.

The move will provide an even balance between conferences and a crossborder rival for the Vancouver Canucks in the Pacific Northwest.

Considering the success of the expansion Vegas Golden Knights, Seattle has seemed a no-brainer from the beginning and no one expects anything but approval Tuesday from the Board of Governors. Seattle would begin play in either 2020 or 2021.

Surely the league will be then done growing for a while?

Maybe not. Two and a half years after voting to add a team in Las Vegas in what has been a rousing success, the NHL has plenty of options when it comes to what’s next.

No North American professional sports league has stretched past the number of 32, but no one is ruling it out for the NHL to get there on this continent or beyond.

“Hockey needs to be and wants to be in those really fast-paced cities that are growing and setting the mark,” Seattle mayor Jenny Durkan said.

Vegas already raised the bar for Seattle, which will pay an expansion fee of $650 million — a 30 percent increase over the $500 million that cleared the way for Vegas to begin play last season and far beyond the $45 million the San Jose Sharks paid to enter the league in 1991 to begin a new era of expansion.

“Not sure there is any magic about 32,” deputy NHL commissioner Bill Daly said. “Expansion is appropriate when a convincing case can be made that it will be beneficial and add value to the league as a whole.”

Flyers

Ron Hextall, the wild goalie who turned into a mild general manager, acknowledged Friday that he was blindsided four days earlier when he was fired as the Flyers general manager. “I was hoping to finish my career here,” he said. He said his face-to-face conversation with club president Paul Holmgren, who informed him Monday he was being let go, lasted 20 seconds. “I didn’t see this coming in any way,” Hextall said. “I was shocked.”

Hurricanes

Carolina sent goalie Scott Darling to their AHL affiliate in Charlotte and said forward Valentin Zykov was claimed on waivers by Edmonton. General manager Don Waddell announced the moves a day after both players were placed on waivers for the purpose of reassignment.