Inside the Bubble Blog: In full clincher mode in Edmonton, Toronto

NHL chief content officer Steve Mayer and League executive vice president of events Dean Matsuzaki -- aka the Mayer of Hub City and Dean of the Secure Zone -- are embedded in the NHL hub cities for the Stanley Cup Qualifiers and the duration of the Stanley Cup Playoffs.

They each will be writing a blog for NHL.com from Edmonton and Toronto to give fans the latest happenings from inside the bubbles.

Here are their entries for Tuesday:

Steve Mayer in Edmonton

I'm really focused now on what happens if these Western Conference First Round series end early and we have teams in our bubble waiting around for other series to finish and the next round to start.

How do we entertain the players that are off and how do we keep their experience as awesome as it's been?

We spent a lot of time this week working with health officials, our medical team and the teams themselves on understanding what the interests would be.

It's amazing that the teams really don't want to talk about it, and I understand that completely.
They don't want to look past their opponents.

But as an event team, we need to be super prepared and, led by Bob Chesterman and Angela Wallin, we are trying to come up with numerous choices just in case.

The weather has been beautiful. It's close to 90 degrees Fahrenheit today. As I look around outside, there are a lot of people taking in the sun. But we also have a lot of asphalt and concrete, and I think the people want to see more and more green space.

Our opening of Commonwealth Stadium over the past week has been a huge hit and we hope to do more activities outside of the bubble, but, obviously, in a place that's exclusive to us and completely safe. So more to come, but it is something that's taking up quite a bit of time.

We still have two or three games a day and I can't commend enough our entire team who don't ever get a day off and maybe get a few hours off here and there. The work ethic in the bubble is something to behold, but I think a lot of people, like myself, have the attitude, "What else are we going to do with our time?"

Please, I'm not complaining, but 36 straight 12- to 15-hour days start to wear on you after a while and I appreciate the great attitude that everyone has.

I'm also really excited about a big announcement we're going to make Monday regarding a huge content play for us that I've personally been working on for the past month. We're looking forward to showing off in a grander way what we're doing here inside the bubble.

We're proud of everything that we've done, and we think it's so unique, I think people will enjoy viewing even more in depth this life. Also, any program we produce is something that might still have legs and interest years from now.

So I'm happy that we've finalized the deal and really excited to talk about that more next week.

Speaking of next week, the Second Round is coming up quickly. By next week, we'll have four fewer teams and more than 200 fewer people inside the bubble.

It's hard to believe, but this place is shrinking a bit, which is good and bad. But we'll continue to try to make it better every day.

So long from Edmonton, but I heard a rumor that Dean left early Monday night to watch the
Boston Bruins-Carolina Hurricanes game from somewhere other than Scotiabank Arena.

Is that true, Dean?

Dean Matsuzaki, in Toronto

I'm not sure who Steve's mole is in the Toronto Hub, but he or she is well-informed. I did leave the 8 p.m. game early Monday night as the sleep deficit was catching up to me. Karma did strike fairly quickly though as I noticed I missed a very exciting third period comeback by the Boston Bruins.

I am currently writing this after Game 4 in our Montreal vs. Philadelphia series, the Flyers have just taken a 3-1 lead in the best-of-7 series. This officially puts us into full on "clincher mode". From now through the conclusion of the first round, every game will be a potential series-clinching game. We now need to have plans in place for a departing team after every game. Charter flight plans, equipment truck plans and hotel plans all have to be ready to go. After several phone calls and emails today I feel the group is ready to react as soon as anything becomes official.

Yesterday I was able to take a few minutes and catch up on some of the great work our NHL Studios group is doing to document life in the bubble and the behind-the-scenes interviews showing what different groups do to make this event all come together. Some great segments on our Hockey Operations group, Game Presentation, Venue Cleaning crew, etc. It is amazing how hard this skeleton crew is working. Under the direction of Tim Kowalski and Matt Nicholson here in the Toronto hub, I see their crew everywhere documenting everything but hadn't had a chance to see a lot of the finished product. Great work guys! I doubt we will see the behind-the-scenes segment on with this group does as they would be producing a feature on themselves. That said, they definitely deserve a little time on the other side of the camera with the spotlight on them for a change.

Sounds like we are getting close to the second game as I can hear the sounds of pregame out in the hallway. I hear players running laps, medicine balls hitting the wall and a group in the distance kicking the soccer ball around (hopefully all the ceiling tiles remain intact today). Time to sign off for today and get back to the work at hand.