NHL commissioner Gary Bettman, left, hands the Stanley Cup to Florida Panthers captain Aleksander Barkov (16) after defeating the Edmonton Oilers in Game 6 of the NHL hockey Stanley Cup Final Tuesday, June 17, 2025, in Sunrise, Fla. (AP Photo/Lynne Sladky)

The NHL and NHL Players’ Association are close to an agreement on an extension of the collective bargaining agreement, two people familiar with negotiations told The Associated Press on Thursday.

The people spoke to the AP on condition on anonymity because the deal had not yet been finalized.

The league and union have been in talks since April and are on the verge of a memorandum of understanding done more than a year before the current CBA expires. The extension would provide extended labor peace in the sport that has had multiple work stoppages, including the 2004-05 lockout that wiped out an entire season, over the past three decades.

Going to an 84-game regular season, up from 82, and reducing exhibition games to four per team, is believed to be among the changes that could be announced as soon as Friday in Los Angeles before the first round of the draft. A playoff salary cap and shorter maximum contract lengths have also been among the reported topics.

Daily Faceoff was first to report a pending announcement of a new CBA.

NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman and NHLPA executive director Marty Walsh foreshadowed a quick conclusion to this process speaking at the Stanley Cup Final earlier this month. Bettman said the sides were “in really good shape, having really good discussions,” and Walsh added that talks were “moving forward, and I feel good with where we are.”

A full, new CBA would be the first since 2013. The league and the union have been working on the memorandum negotiated in 2020 to finish that season during the pandemic and would meld that agreement with the framework from 12 years ago.