NHL’s top teams face dilemma on what round-robin play means

Long before Peter DeBoer coached two teams to the Stanley Cup Final, he got some experience at Canadian junior hockey’s Memorial Cup that could serve him well right about now. While 16 teams battle it out in best-of-five elimination series to advance, the top four in each conference play each other in separate mini- tournaments to decide seeding. Boston, Tampa Bay, the Capitals and Philadelphia in the East and St. Louis, Colorado, the Vegas G olden Knights and Dallas in the West finished in that order when the season stopped in March, but that’s almost meaningless now.