MetLife Stadium will host NHL games on back to back days as part of next year’s Stadium Series, the league announced Saturday. The Devils will play the Flyers on Feb. 17, and the Rangers and Islanders will face off on Feb. 18 in East Rutherford, N.J.
“We had always wanted to go back to play a game a MetLife Stadium. It’s always been an interest of ours,” NHL executive Steve Mayer said in a statement. “MetLife is an extremely difficult place to think about doing a Winter Classic because of the two NFL teams that are in that building, the Jets and the Giants. So we also had been talking to them on and off and been interested for a long time.”
This will be the first time MetLife plays host to hockey games. Yankee Stadium (Bronx), Citi Field (Queens) and Highmark Stadium (Orchard Park) in the state of New York have held games previously, although not since 2018. In recent years, the league has held games in Raleigh, Boston, Nashville, Minneapolis and Hamilton, Ontario.
The NHL established the Winter Classic in 2008 and added the Stadium Series in 2014. The Rangers will play in their fifth outdoor game, having won their previous four. The Flyers are 1-4 in five outdoor appearances. The Islanders and Devils have both played outdoors once before, with each losing to the Rangers at Yankee Stadium in 2014.
Besides the Stadium Series, the NHL already has scheduled the Winter Classic for a Jan. 1, 2024, game between the Golden Knights and Kraken at T-Mobile Park in Seattle, the home of the Mariners.
