In the 2021-2022 season, the teams will play 56 games in the regular season. The playoffs will start on March 4.
The KHL has confirmed the structure for next season’s championship, releasing details of how the schedule will fit around the 2022 Winter Olympic Games in Beijing. Each team will play 56 regular season games — down from 62 in 2020-2021. There will be home and away match-ups with every opponent (46 games in total), plus an additional home and away game against five other teams from the same Conference (10 games).
The season is scheduled to start on Sep. 1 2021 with the Opening Cup game between defending champion Avangard and runner-up CSKA. The final regular season games will be played on March 1. There will be an additional break during the season due to the Olympics, which will take place in February in Beijing. The playoffs are set to start on March 4, 2022, and if needed, game seven of the Gagarin Cup final would be on April 30.
Next season should see the KHL return to 24 competing teams, prompting the following changes in the divisions and conferences. Torpedo moves back to the Western Conference and joins the Bobrov Division, meaning Severstal goes into the Tarasov. If Admiral (*) returns as planned, it will go back into the Chernyshev Division, with Kunlun Red Star moving into the Kharlamov Division.
(*) Admiral will be accepted into the KHL next season if it pays all the money owed to players and coaches by July 31, 2021.
Western Conference
SKA St. Petersburg
Jokerit Helsinki
Spartak Moscow
Torpedo Nizhny Novgorod Region
Vityaz Moscow Region
HC Sochi
CSKA Moscow
Dynamo Moscow
Lokomotiv Yaroslavl
Severstal Cherepovets
Dinamo Minsk
Dinamo Riga
Eastern Conference
Ak Bars Kazan
Avtomobilist Ekaterinburg
Metallurg Magnitogorsk
Traktor Chelyabinsk
Neftekhimik Nizhnekamsk
Kunlun Red Star Beijing
Admiral Vladivostok
Amur Khabarovsk
Avangard Omsk
Barys Nur-Sultan
Salavat Yulaev Ufa
Sibir Novosibirsk Region
