Finally, after almost three years of posturing, misdirection and otherwise negotiating through intermediaries, all the primary stakeholders in the NHL's Olympic decision-making process will be in the same room together.
On Friday, International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach, International Ice Hockey Federation president René Fasel and National Hockey League Players' Association executive director Donald Fehr will all descend on New York to meet with NHL commissioner Gary Bettman and discuss what it will take to coax the league into showing up for the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, South Korea.
According to sources, Bach and Fasel requested the meeting because time is running short and both the IOC and the IIHF need a firm answer soon – yes or no – with the Olympics roughly one year away.
The NHL has closed up shop to participate in the past five Winter Olympics, dating back to 1998, but has been dragging its feet on a decision this time around for a myriad of ever-changing reasons.
If the NHL skips the Olympics, it will force the IOC and IIHF to stage a tournament with players from Europe's domestic leagues and North American minor leagues and juniors for the first time since 1994, which will greatly diminish its appeal to both spectators and television audiences.
And while no one expects the principal players in Friday's meeting to emerge with an agreement in place, it's long past time for everybody to lay their cards on the table.
Fasel has been pushing hard for the NHL's participation and will play the good cop in this negotiation. He has long believed that the best way to preach the gospel of hockey is to have the best players compete at the world's primary sporting showcase – and is even willing to cover the NHL's out-of-pocket costs to attend.
Bach, as IOC president, has taken a far more hardline approach.
Thus far, he has steadfastly refused to pick up the NHL's Olympic expenses – a policy shift from the five previous Olympics that has had Bettman chuffed for some time now.
Theoretically, Bach could put additional pressure on the league by saying that if the NHL opts out of the Olympics in Pyeongchang then it wouldn't be welcome in Beijing four years later. The 2022 Olympics in China hold a far greater appeal for the NHL because the league sees it as a chance to establish a toehold in an emerging market.
The NHL is planning to play a pair of exhibition games in China this fall, though it will need approval for that initiative from the players' association. That hasn't come yet.
One worrisome note that might give the NHL pause: What happens if it says no to the Olympics, and then a handful of its most prominent players decide to go anyway?
Alex Ovechkin of the Washington Capitals heads that list. Ovechkin has said repeatedly that the Olympics matter a great deal to him and he will go, even if league play continues. Ted Leonsis, the owner in Washington, supports this. But if Ovechkin goes, can Leonsis reasonably say no to fellow Russians Evgeny Kuznetsov and Dmitri Orlov or any of the other players on his team who might want to participate?
Suddenly, if the Capitals excuse three Russians, a couple of Swedes and a prominent American or Canadian player or two, then for three weeks in February next year the team is going to resemble its minor-league affiliate far too closely.
If enough NHL players go AWOL and play in the Olympics, that could threaten the competitive balance of the league and have a critical impact on the always-tight playoff races. And it would not make much sense for the league to issue an ultimatum and fine or suspend players for going to the Olympics, because it really doesn't want to go to war with its most marketable faces and names. Moreover, it's not hard to imagine that a fan backlash or even boycott could emerge if the league plays through the Olympics and the tournament becomes a showcase for minor-league players.
In short, it's a complicated, multilayered negotiation, and throughout his NHL executive career, Bettman has shown a willingness to take negotiations right down to the wire.
This one, apparently, is no different.
Last weekend, as January came to a close and the board of governors assembled at the NHL all-star game in Los Angeles, Bettman could have easily slammed the door shut on Olympic participation. Instead, he left it open just a crack, presumably to see if Bach, Fasel and/or Fehr were prepared to put something new on the table, which is what NHL deputy commissioner Bill Daly suggested it would take to convince the league to change its mind.
To casual fans, all this dithering makes no sense. Going to the Olympics is the right thing to do. The fans want to see it. The players want to do it. And it's good for hockey – the sport and the industry – to compete on the world's largest sporting stage.
These are smart people, and while all of them have a stubborn streak, you have to think common sense will eventually prevail and they'll figure it out, even if it goes to the 11th hour and 59th minute. And if they can't, they deserve whatever consequences hockey fans choose to rain down upon their respective houses.