NHL confirms at Board of Governors meeting that next season’s salary cap on track to be $87.7 million

The NHL is on track to see its largest salary cap increase since before the COVID-19 pandemic next season.

At the Board of Governors meeting on Monday, the league confirmed that revenue projections for the season are going as expected and the salary cap for the 2024-25 season is set to rise from $83.5 million to $87.7 million.

The salary cap has increased by only $2 million over the past five seasons because of the league’s revenue shortfall during the pandemic. Now the players have paid back their debts to the league for the lost quarter-season and playoffs in 2019-20 and the semi-season that was with and without fans in 2021, the salary cap will start to rise at a normal pace again.

It was $81.5 million in three consecutive seasons between 2019-20 and 2021-22 and it rose to $82.5 million for 2022-23 and to $83.5 million for 2023-24. The $4.2 million jump to the expected $87.7 million figure in 2024-25 will be the largest the league has seen since the salary cap ceiling jumped from $75 million to $79.5 million in 2019.

For many teams who are pressed tight to the cal ceiling, including the Edmonton Oilers, a jump like this one will be very helpful in the off-season. The Oilers have about $73 million committed to seven forwards, five defencemen, and two goaltenders for 2024-25 and they’ll also have Connor Brown’s performance bonus from this season carried over as an overage.

Brown, Warren Foegele, Mattias Janmark, Adam Erne, Sam Gagner, and Vincent Desharnais are set to become unrestricted free agents while Philip Broberg and Dylan Holloway headline a list of young players who will have reached the end of their entry-level contracts.