Report: No NHL camps before July 10

NHL players were informed on Thursday that formal training camps (Phase 3 of the return-to-play plan) will not begin any sooner than July 10, according to a report from Sportsnet's Elliotte Friedman.

Gary Bettman on Tuesday said that training camps will not open before July 1, so today's news pushes the earliest start date for camps back nine more days. The start of training camps will still be reliant on the guidance from medical and civil authorities.

That timeline would likely now push the restart of the 2019-20 season to August at the earliest, given that teams are expected to have three-week training camps before the start of the qualifying round.

In early June the NHL expects to move into Phase 2 of the return-to-play plan, which involves small group, voluntary, and on- and off-ice training.