NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman spoke on CNBC’s “Squawk Box” on November 20, 2024.
CNBC
The 2026 Winter Olympics in Milan will mark the first time in 12 years when NHL players return to the game. NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman expects it to have a major impact on the league.
“In the end, we decided it was important to go back and become one of the most visible platforms in the world in terms of balancing pros and cons,” Bettman said Tuesday at the CNBC Sports and Boardroom Game Planning Conference in Santa Monica, California.
Before Bettman was appointed commissioner in 1993, no NHL athletes were involved in the Olympics. The league and NHL Players Association have been working to get players involved since 1998, Bettman said after firsthand seeing the effects Olympic players had on the NBA.
However, its participation stopped after the Sochi Games in 2014. Bettman said it reflects the evolution of the business in the league and the sports industry in general.
“It was a bit of a mixed bag,” Bettman said of the NHL’s participation in the Olympics. “We were closed for two weeks, but the players were treated like invited guests,” he said, adding that the league and its teams “we had no control over anything. We had no right to promote ourselves.”
There was also a competitive challenge considering the number of players some teams were sending out.
It was a change in relationship that brought the NHL back to Olympic ice. The new NHL and NHLPA agreement with the IOC changes several aspects of the commercial arrangement and upgrades the living conditions of players during the game.
But Bettman also said he came down to a desire from players to play the best-on-best at the national level, something highlighted in the league’s successful 4 Nations face-off tournament earlier this year.
“It has become clear to me that it is important for our players who have the history and traditions that represent their country,” he said.
The NHL has suspended play for nearly two weeks this season, with Bettman saying that participating in the Olympics is “no difficult.” The NHL does not officially guarantee that players will participate in the 2030 games.
“But it should be worth it, with a balance,” he said.
Disclosure: CNBC Parent NBCUniversal owns NBC Sports and the NBC Olympics. The NBC Olympics are the US broadcasting rights holders for all summer and winter games until 2036.
