SKATING BACKWARDS

NHL Will Not Participate in 2018 Olympics

League wanted compensation for players involved.

The National Hockey League will not participate in the 2018 Winter Olympic Games in Pyeongchang, Sportsnet reported on Monday. The league stopped its winter play for the 2014 games in Sochi, but because the International Olympic Committee has refused to continue compensating the NHL for player insurance and travel costs, the league reportedly finds little reason to participate. “[W]hile the overwhelming majority of our Clubs are adamantly opposed to disrupting the 2017-18 NHL season for purposes of accommodating Olympic participation by some NHL players, we were open to hearing from any of the other parties who might have an interest in the issue,” the league said in a statement. “A number of months have now passed and no meaningful dialogue has materialized. Instead, the IOC has now expressed the position that the NHL’s participation in Beijing in 2022 is conditioned on our participation in South Korea in 2018... We now consider the matter officially closed.” Several team owners have expressed interest in preventing their players from participating on their own, but Sportsnet notes that other teams may allow theirs to do so.