2020 NLL season

The 2020 National Lacrosse League season, formally known as the 2019–2020 season, was the 34th in the history of the NLL. The season began on November 29, 2019 and was scheduled to end with the NLL final in late spring of 2020.^[2][3] However due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the season was suspended on March 12, 2020.^[4] On April 8, the league made a further public statement announcing the cancellation of the remaining games of the 2020 season and that they would be exploring options for playoffs once it was safe to resume play.^[5][6]

2020 NLL season
League	National Lacrosse League
Sport	Indoor lacrosse (box lacrosse)
Duration	November 29, 2019 — March 12, 2020
Number of games	18
Number of teams	13
TV partner(s)	B/R Live[1] (United States) Twitter and Facebook (Globally)
Regular season
Top seed	New England Black Wolves
Season MVP	Shayne Jackson
Top scorer	Callum Crawford
Playoffs

This season was the inaugural season for the expansion Knighthawks^[7] and Riptide.^[8][9] The former Rochester Knighthawks under owner Curt Styres relocated to Halifax for this season while Pegula Sports and Entertainment took over the Knighthawks moniker with a new expansion team.^[10][11][12]

With the addition of two teams, the NLL was realigned into a three division league. The five west division teams remained the same but the six east division and two expansion teams were distributed into a north and a new east division. The top-two teams in each division would qualify for the playoffs plus and additional two wild card teams.^[13]

Teams

Bandits

Thunder
birds

Hawks

Rock

Swarm

Wolves

Riptide

Wings

Rough
necks

Mammoth

Rush

Seals

Warriors

North Division East Division West Division

2020 National Lacrosse League
Division	Team	City	Arena	Capacity
North	Buffalo Bandits	Buffalo, New York	KeyBank Center	19,070
	Halifax Thunderbirds	Halifax, Nova Scotia	Scotiabank Centre	10,500
	Rochester Knighthawks	Rochester, New York	Blue Cross Arena	10,662
	Toronto Rock	Toronto, Ontario	Scotiabank Arena	18,800
East	Georgia Swarm	Duluth, Georgia	Infinite Energy Arena	10,500
	New England Black Wolves	Uncasville, Connecticut	Mohegan Sun Arena	7,074
	New York Riptide	Uniondale, New York	Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum	13,917
	Philadelphia Wings	Philadelphia, Pennsylvania	Wells Fargo Center	19,306
West	Calgary Roughnecks	Calgary, Alberta	Scotiabank Saddledome	19,289
	Colorado Mammoth	Denver, Colorado	Pepsi Center	18,007
	San Diego Seals	San Diego, California	Pechanga Arena	12,920
	Saskatchewan Rush	Saskatoon, Saskatchewan	SaskTel Centre	15,195
	Vancouver Warriors	Vancouver, British Columbia	Rogers Arena	18,910

Regular season

Reference: ^[14]

North Division

P	Team	GP	W	L	PCT	GB	Home	Road	GF	GA	Diff	GF/GP	GA/GP
1	Halifax Thunderbirds	12	8	4	.667	0.0	6–1	2–3	139	126	+13	11.58	10.50
2	Toronto Rock	11	7	4	.636	0.5	4–2	3–2	122	106	+16	11.09	9.64
3	Buffalo Bandits	11	7	4	.636	0.5	4–2	3–2	130	118	+12	11.82	10.73
4	Rochester Knighthawks	12	2	10	.167	6.0	2–3	0–7	115	165	−50	9.58	13.75

East Division

P	Team	GP	W	L	PCT	GB	Home	Road	GF	GA	Diff	GF/GP	GA/GP
1	New England Black Wolves	11	8	3	.727	0.0	4–3	4–0	135	101	+34	12.27	9.18
2	Georgia Swarm	12	7	5	.583	1.5	2–4	5–1	149	126	+23	12.42	10.50
3	Philadelphia Wings	14	8	6	.571	1.5	3–3	5–3	151	134	+17	10.79	9.57
4	New York Riptide	13	1	12	.077	8.0	1–5	0–7	116	177	−61	8.92	13.62

West Division

P	Team	GP	W	L	PCT	GB	Home	Road	GF	GA	Diff	GF/GP	GA/GP
1	Saskatchewan Rush	10	7	3	.700	0.0	2–3	5–0	111	93	+18	11.10	9.30
2	Colorado Mammoth	13	7	6	.538	1.5	4–2	3–4	128	125	+3	9.85	9.62
3	San Diego Seals	12	6	6	.500	2.0	3–3	3–3	138	131	+7	11.50	10.92
4	Calgary Roughnecks	10	5	5	.500	2.0	1–4	4–1	122	111	+11	12.20	11.10
5	Vancouver Warriors	13	4	9	.308	4.5	2–4	2–5	117	160	−43	9.00	12.31

x: Clinched playoff berth; c: Clinched playoff berth by crossing over to another division; y: Clinched division; z: Clinched best regular season record; GP: Games Played
W: Wins; L: Losses; GB: Games back; PCT: Win percentage; Home: Record at Home; Road: Record on the Road; GF: Goals scored; GA: Goals allowed
Differential: Difference between goals scored and allowed; GF/GP: Average number of goals scored per game; GA/GP: Average number of goals allowed per game

Awards

Annual awards

References: Winners^[15]

Award	Winner	Other Finalists
Most Valuable Player	Shayne Jackson, Georgia Swarm	Callum Crawford, New England Black Wolves Rob Hellyer, Toronto Rock
Goaltender of the Year	Doug Jamieson, New England Black Wolves	Zach Higgins, Philadelphia Wings Dillon Ward, Colorado Mammoth
Defensive Player of the Year	Graeme Hossack, Halifax Thunderbirds	Robert Hope, Colorado Mammoth Kyle Rubisch, Saskatchewan Rush
Transition Player of the Year	Challen Rogers, Toronto Rock	Zach Currier, Calgary Roughnecks Kiel Matisz, Philadelphia Wings
Rookie of the Year	Tyson Gibson, New York Riptide	Connor Fields, San Diego Seals Andrew Kew, New England Black Wolves
Sportsmanship Award	Lyle Thompson, Georgia Swarm	Kyle Buchanan, San Diego Seals Curtis Knight, Rochester Knighthawks
GM of the Year	Paul Day, Philadelphia Wings	Jamie Dawick, Toronto Rock Rich Lisk, New England Black Wolves
Les Bartley Award	Paul Day, Philadelphia Wings	Mike Accursi, Halifax Thunderbirds Glenn Clark, New England Black Wolves
Executive of the Year Award	John Catalano, Halifax Thunderbirds	Matt Hutchings, Colorado Mammoth Rich Lisk, New England Black Wolves
Teammate of the Year Award	Dan Dawson, Toronto Rock (tie) Mike Poulin, Georgia Swarm	John Ranagan, New England Black Wolves
Tom Borrelli Award	Craig Rybczynski	Jake Elliott Teddy Jenner

Stadiums and locations

Georgia Swarm	New England Black Wolves	New York Riptide	Philadelphia Wings
Gas South Arena	Mohegan Sun Arena	Nassau Coliseum	Wells Fargo Center
Capacity: 11,355	Capacity: 7,700	Capacity: 13,917	Capacity: 19,543

Buffalo Bandits	Halifax Thunderbirds	Rochester Knighthawks	Toronto Rock
KeyBank Center	Scotiabank Centre[2]	Blue Cross Arena	Scotiabank Arena
Capacity: 19,070	Capacity: 10,595	Capacity: 11,200	Capacity: 18,819

Calgary Roughnecks	Colorado Mammoth	San Diego Seals	Saskatchewan Rush	Vancouver Warriors
Scotiabank Saddledome	Ball Arena	Pechanga Arena	SaskTel Centre	Rogers Arena
Capacity: 19,289	Capacity: 18,007	Capacity: 12,920	Capacity: 15,190	Capacity: 18,910

Attendance

Home Team	Home Games	Average Attendance	Total Attendance[16]
Calgary Roughnecks	5	12,677	63,387
Buffalo Bandits	6	12,089	72,537
Saskatchewan Rush	5	12,007	60,039
Colorado Mammoth	6	11,586	69,521
Toronto Rock	6	8,339	50,037
Philadelphia Wings	6	8,054	48,325
Halifax Thunderbirds	7	7,642	53,496
Georgia Swarm	6	7,613	45,681
Vancouver Warriors	6	6,769	40,616
New England Black Wolves	7	5,132	35,928
Rochester Knighthawks	5	5,050	25,252
San Diego Seals	6	4,829	28,977
New York Riptide	6	4,157	24,942
League	77	8,035	618,738

See also

• 2020 in sports

References

1. Hepburn, Tmera (December 12, 2019). "Lacrosse Fans Can Now Watch a 'Game Of The Week' For Free – Here's How". Cord Cutters News.
2. "NLL Announces brands and identities for its two newest teams". NLL.com. February 17, 2019. Retrieved August 24, 2019.
3. "2019-20 National Lacrosse League Schedule Released". National Lacrosse League. Retrieved December 27, 2019.
4. "NLL Statement on game play (March 12, 2020)". NLL.com. March 12, 2020. Retrieved July 5, 2020.
5. "National Lacrosse League cancels remainder of season due to COVID-19". Sportsnet.
6. "National Lacrosse League announces cancellation of remaining regular season games". NLL.com. April 8, 2020. Retrieved July 5, 2020.
7. "Knighthawks Unveil New Logo Ahead of Expansion Season". Spectrum News. May 30, 2019. Retrieved December 19, 2019.
8. "N.Y. National Lacrosse League team named "Riptide"". Long Island Herald. February 18, 2019. Retrieved October 18, 2019.
9. "Welcome to the NLL Halifax Thunderbirds and New York Riptide". Inside Lacrosse. February 18, 2019. Retrieved October 18, 2019.
10. "NLL Announces the Rochester Knighthawks are Moving to Halifax for 2019-20 Season". Inside Lacrosse. September 13, 2019. Retrieved October 18, 2019.
11. Johnson, Melanie (September 13, 2018). "Knighthawks owner leaving, Pegulas taking over franchise". Spectrum News. Retrieved December 19, 2019.
12. Parsons, Jack (December 6, 2019). "Halifax Thunderbirds to play first regular season game this weekend". Halifax Today. Retrieved December 19, 2019.
13. Ferger, Michael (9 September 2019). "NLL Announces Division Realignment for 2019/2020 Season". Vancouver Warriors. Retrieved 20 May 2024.
14. "2020 National Lacrosse League Standings". Pointstreak Stats.
15. "NLL announces 2019-20 NLL award winners". NLL.com. June 30, 2020. Retrieved July 5, 2020.
16. "2022 Season". nllstats.com. Retrieved 16 June 2023.