The ECHL has realigned into four divisions instead of six, with two new teams joining the Solar Bears in the South Division.
The ECHL has realigned for the 2016-2017 season. Instead of six divisions of four or five teams each, the league has condensed to four divisions with six or seven teams each, and a playoff system that resembles the NHL and AHL. (The old playoff system was based on conference-wide points and seeding rather than division-wide.) This realignment was implemented so that the ECHL could have cheaper, geographically closer playoffs.
This season's regular season games have already been scheduled against each team's rivals from the previous alignment, but this will change in 2017-2018.