Toronto is hosting the NHL All Star Game – here’s what’s happening and how it all works

The 2024 Hyundai NHL Fan Fair has been unveiled by the League, a sprawling, family-friendly fan festival spanning four days and 300,000 square feet. Set to transpire at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre South Building from February 1-4, the event promises a diverse range of attractions catering to all ages.

NHL All-Star Thursday will be held at Scotiabank Arena in Toronto at 6 p.m. ET on Feb. 1, followed by the NHL All-Star Skills presented by DraftKings Sportsbook on Feb. 2 and the Rogers NHL All-Star Game on Feb. 3 in the 2024 NHL All-Star Weekend.

Attendees can engage in interactive hockey games, explore a dedicated kids zone tailored for the sport’s youngest enthusiasts, and enjoy special appearances by current NHL Players, NHL Alumni, and NHL Mascots. The festival will also showcase memorabilia and trophies, providing fans with the unique opportunity to capture a photo with the coveted Stanley Cup. Additionally, the admission price encompasses participation in the NHL STREET showcase tournament and various other exciting events.

NHL All-Star Thursday

NHL All-Star Thursday kicks off at 6:00 PM on February 1, 2024, at Toronto’s Scotiabank Arena. Begin the All-Star Weekend on an exhilarating note with a day brimming with events, featuring the Tim Hortons NHL All-Star Player Draft, the NHL Alumni Man of the Year celebration, a tribute to the 1967 Toronto Maple Leafs, and the Canadian Tire Professional Women’s Hockey League 3-on-3 Showcase.

Tim Hortons NHL All-Star Player Draft

The NHL will select 32 players for the NHL All-Star Game, one from each team. The NHL All-Star Fan Vote will return in January, enabling the fans to select 12 players to complete the rosters.

Celebrities will be paired with captains, who will pick the teams for the NHL All-Star Game from a pool of players (see bottom of this article) selected by the NHL and the fans.

The League will select captains (see bottom of article) from the pool of 44 players and pair them with celebrities for the Tim Hortons NHL All-Star Player Draft, and the captains will pick the four teams for the 3-on-3 tournament from the remaining pool of players.

Captains have picked the teams three times before: at Carolina in 2011, Ottawa in 2012 and Columbus in 2015.

“We felt like that was something that was a really fun piece in past years,” Mayer said. “We started to hear our fans, our players, ask, ‘What about the draft?’ And we’ve seen some other leagues doing after we did it first, and we were like, ‘You know what? I think it’s time for us to bring it back.’”

2024 NHL All-Star Skills presented by DraftKings Sportsbook

February 2, 2024 | 7:00 PM | Scotiabank Arena, Toronto

Experience the excitement of the 2024 NHL All-Star Skills, presented by DraftKings Sportsbook, featuring a revamped format. Witness 12 elite NHL All-Stars vying for points in eight thrilling events, where the top point-earner secures a grand prize of $1 million!

Skills competition – THE CATEGORIES

Fastenal NHL Fastest Skater

Rogers NHL Hardest Shot

Upper Deck NHL Stick Handling

NHL One Timers

NHL Passing Challenge

Cheetos NHL Accuracy Shooting

Round 2,

The top eight point-earners progress to the seventh event:

The Honda NHL Shootout,

The shootout allows each player to choose the goalie they’ll face.

In the final stage, following the Shootout, the leading six point-earners advance to the eighth and concluding event:

The Pepsi NHL Obstacle Course, Where Point Totals Are Doubled!

The NHL All-Star with the highest accumulated points after these eight events will be crowned the ultimate winner!

The 2024 All-Star Game

Diverging from past seasons where teams were divided by division, as mentioned, the 2024 All-Star Weekend introduces the Tim Hortons NHL All-Star Player Draft. During this event, All-Star players and celebrity captains will collaboratively form four teams of 11 from the players selected for the All-Star Game through a combination of NHL choices and fan votes.

The 2024 NHL All-Star Game will take place Feb. 3 and will be available on ABC, ESPN+, SN, CBC and TVAS.

Professional Women’s Hockey League 3-on-3 Showcase

The new (Professional Women’s Hockey League) PWHL will be featured in prime time as part of all star weekend. The PWHL spans teams in Toronto, Montreal, Ottawa, Boston, Minneapolis-St. Paul, and New York City. NHL Deputy Commissioner Bill Daly expressed the league’s desire to be “helpful” to the PWHL in finding its place in the North American sports landscape. While the NHL provides knowledge and experience, there is no financial support involved. Women’s players have previously participated in NHL all-star skills competitions, aligning with the league’s interest in showcasing them during marquee events.

Justin Bieber All-Star Jerseys

In collaboration with pop sensation Justin Bieber and the fashion label Drew House, the NHL and Adidas have joined forces to introduce a new collection of jerseys for the upcoming NHL All-Star Game in Toronto. The specially designed jerseys, featuring vibrant blue, red, yellow, and white colours, represent each all-star team and showcase a prominent NHL crest atop a star. Justin Bieber, co-founder of the Drew House fashion label, will be present at the all-star weekend hosted by the Toronto Maple Leafs. The NHL, aiming for a “fresh perspective” on the all-star jerseys, offers fans the opportunity to purchase them online and at selected retailers. Bieber, who co-established Drew House in 2018, brings his creative touch to this exciting collaboration.

Unlike previous seasons when the teams were split up by division, 2024 All-Star Weekend will feature the Tim Hortons NHL All-Star Player Draft (on Feb. 1 6 p.m. ET; SN, ESPN). All-Star players and celebrity captains will pick four teams of 11 from the players selected to the All-Star Game by the NHL and fan vote.

“After the tremendous success of our first NHL, adidas and drew house collaboration for the Toronto Maple Leafs’ Next Gen jerseys, we looked forward to another opportunity to bring a bold, fashion-forward look to NHL jerseys,” NHL chief brand officer and senior executive vice president Brian Jennings said. “The All-Star Weekend in Toronto is the perfect setting for a fresh perspective on the All-Star jersey. The vibrant colors in this year’s All-Star collection are both youthful and classic and offer the perfect complement to the young NHL talent set to meet in Toronto for this year’s NHL All-Star Weekend.”

Toronto All-Stars

This season, Nylander holds the fifth position in the scoring race and recently signed a lucrative 92 million dollars contract, while Matthews stands out as the league leader with an impressive 32 goals. Reilly is enjoying a strong performance, contributing significantly on both offensive and defensive fronts. Marner is showcasing his usual playmaking skills, and it’s likely that he will finish the season between 90 and 100 points.

What To Watch For

Key storylines are set to unfold within the upcoming All-Star Game, promising an afternoon filled with intriguing narratives. Firstly, a new MVP will emerge, with last year’s winner Claude Giroux likely enjoying some time off. Connor McDavid stands as an early favorite for the MVP title, but Jack Hughes, leading the NHL in 3-on-3 overtime points, presents a strong contender.

Tickets for all All-Star weekend events can be purchased through Ticketmaster..

Tickets for All-Star Thursday are going for as little as $44 per person, so it’ll be a great affordable way to get in on the action.

Ticket packages for the weekend are available, with prices starting at $1799 (for 300-level seats). Packages include access to Saturday’s NHL All-Star Skills and Sunday’s All-Star game as well as included pre-game food and drink and a Stanley Cup photo-op.

Presale has started on individual tickets for All-Star skills and the All-Star tournament, with prices starting at $273.70 and $462.91, respectively.

For those not willing to shell out a small fortune for the opportunity to see the game live, it will also be broadcast on Sportsnet, as will all All-Star Thursday events

2024 NHL All-Stars

Auston Matthews and Connor Bedard highlight the group of 32 players selected by the NHL to play in the 2024 NHL All-Star Game at Scotiabank Arena in Toronto on Feb. 3.

Matthews, who leads the NHL with 30 goals, will represent the host Toronto Maple Leafs. Bedard, the No. 1 pick in the 2023 NHL Draft, leads the Chicago Blackhawks and all NHL rookies with 33 points (15 goals, 18 assists).

Fans select the final 12 players (eight skaters, four goalies) through the 2024 NHL All-Star Fan Vote presented by MassMutual, which is underway and runs through Jan. 11. Fans can vote at NHL.com/vote and via X (formerly Twitter) and the NHL App.

From this group of players (below) four teams will be formed via a draft process picked by four captains in tandem with celebrities. It is not as complicated as it sounds. So far we know Conor McDavid and Auston Matthews have been named as two of the captains, and Justin Bieber will be one of the celebrities.

Coaches 2024 NHL All-Star Game

The four coaches for the 2024 NHL All-Star Game will be Jim Montgomery of the Boston Bruins, Peter Laviolette of the New York Rangers, Rick Tocchet from the Vancouver Canucks and Rick Bowness from the Winnipeg Jets.

Montgomery makes his second straight All-Star coaching appearance. He’s guided Boston (25-8-8, .702 points percentage) to the top of the Eastern Conference, following up a record-setting first season as coach. He won the Jack Adams Award in 2022-23 after Boston established new NHL single-season records for wins (65) and points (135).

Meanwhile, Bowness, who has led the Winnipeg Jets to the best points percentage in the NHL at the midway point of the season has coached 762 NHL games in the regular season and 54 in the Stanley Cup Playoffs. He has never coached an NHL All-Star Game. Until now.

Laviolette will be coaching his third All-Star Game, the most recent in 2018 as coach of the Nashville Predators. He has led the Rangers (26-13-2, .659 points percentage) to first place in the Metropolitan Division in his first season with the team.

Rick Tocchet rounds out the coaching group. He will be behind the bench for his second All-Star Game after leading the Canucks (29-11-3, .709 points percentage) to first in the Pacific Division. The former “NHL On TNT” studio analyst was hired on Jan. 22, 2023, to replace Bruce Boudreau, who was fired after the team lost 28 of its first 46 games last season. As coach of the Arizona Coyotes, Tocchet replaced Gerard Gallant as Pacific Division coach at the 2020 All-Star Game in St. Louis after Gallant was fired by the Vegas Golden Knights on Jan. 15, 2020.

Complete 2024 NHL All-Star Game rosters:

Player (All-Star Appearance)

F Frank Vatrano, ANA (1st)

F Clayton Keller, ARI (4th)

F David Pastrnak, BOS (4th)

G Jeremy Swayman, BOS (1st) – voted in

D Rasmus Dahlin, BUF (3rd)

F Elias Lindholm, CGY (1st)

F Sebastian Aho, CAR (3rd)

F Connor Bedard, CHI (1st)

G Alexandar Georgiev, COL (1st) – voted in

F Nathan MacKinnon, COL (5th)

D Cale Makar, COL (3rd) – voted in

F Boone Jenner, CBJ (1st)

G Jake Oettinger, DAL (1st)

F Alex DeBrincat, DET (2nd)

F Leon Draisaitl, EDM (5th) – voted in

F Connor McDavid, EDM (7th)

G Sergei Bobrovsky, FLA (2nd) – voted in

F Sam Reinhart, FLA (1st)

G Cam Talbot, LAK (2nd)

F Kirill Kaprizov, MIN (3rd)

F Nick Suzuki, MTL (3rd)

F Filip Forsberg, NSH (2nd)

F Jack Hughes, NJD (3rd)

F Mathew Barzal, NYI (3rd)

G Igor Shesterkin, NYR (2nd)

F Brady Tkachuk, OTT (4th)

F Travis Konecny, PHI (2nd)

F Sidney Crosby, PIT (6th)

F Tomas Hertl, SJS (2nd)

F Oliver Bjorkstrand, SEA (1st)

F Robert Thomas, STL (1st)

F Nikita Kucherov, TBL (5th)

F Mitchell Marner, TOR (3rd) – voted in

F Auston Matthews, TOR (5th)

F William Nylander, TOR (1st) – voted in

D Morgan Rielly, TOR (1st) – voted in

F Brock Boeser, VAN (2nd) – voted in

G Thatcher Demko, VAN (2nd) – voted in

D Quinn Hughes, VAN (2nd)

F J.T. Miller, VAN (1st) – voted in

F Elias Pettersson, VAN (4th) – voted in

F Jack Eichel, VGK (4th)

F Tom Wilson, WSH (2nd)

G Connor Hellebuyck, WPG (4th)

Tickets to the 2024 NHL All-Star Skills presented by DraftKings Sportsbook are available at Ticketmaster Verified Resale, the official resale partner of the NHL. In addition, tickets to the 2024 Hyundai NHL Fan Fair, the official fan festival of the 2024 NHL All-Star Weekend, are available for purchase at NHL.com/FanFair while supplies last. NHL All-Star Thursday is open to the public, and tickets are available here.

The 2024 NHL All-Star Game is taking place at Scotiabank Arena in Toronto on Feb. 3 and will be available on ABC, ESPN+, SN, CBC and TVAS.

by Myles Shane

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