There may be nothing more disruptive for hockey players’ routines - and fans’ routines - than a weird afternoon start time. Noon? Too early. Three o’clock? When are you supposed to take a nap?
Two o’clock local Edmonton time? Even worse. That means it’s a 4:00 start in St. Louis, which is too early to hop over to a sports bar and have dinner, or order a pizza. There’s still not much room for complaining for us, though - normally the games against Western Canadian teams start so late that we’re either finishing a pot of coffee to get through them or just asleep on the couch at the start of the third.