NHL-Hockey-Teams

The National Hockey League NHL originated in 1917 with four Hockey Teams, and through a sequence of NHL teams expansions, reductions, and relocations currently consists of 30 Hockey TEAMS, 24 of which are based in the United States and six in Canada. The Montreal Canadiens are the most successful NHL Hockey franchise with 24 Stanley Cup championships; in the four major North American professional sports leagues the Montreal Canadiens are only surpassed in the number of championships by the New York Yankees of Major League Baseball, who have two more. The next most successful franchise is the Toronto Maple Leafs with 13 Stanley Cups, but they have not won a championship since 1967. The Detroit Red Wings, with 11 Stanley Cups, is the most successful American franchise. The longest streak of winning the Stanley Cup in consecutive years is five, held by the Montreal Canadiens from 1955–56 to 1959–60; the New York Islanders (1980–1983) and the Montreal Canadiens (1976–1979) have four-year championship streaks. The 1977 edition of the Montreal Canadiens, the second of four straight Stanley Cup champions, was named by ESPN as the second greatest sports teams of all-time.

Of all the major leagues in North America, the NHL is the only league to field teams that play in two countries' capital cities, Ottawa and Washington, DC

The current NHL league organization divides the teams into two conferences. Each conference has three divisions, and each division has five teams. The current organization has roots in the 1998–99 season where a league realignment added two divisions to bring the total number of divisions to six; the current teams alignment began with the 2000–2001 Hockey season when the Minnesota Wild and the Columbus Blue Jackets joined the NHL as expansion teams.