Members of the Professional Hockey Players’ Association are on the verge of staging a strike in the ECHL if the union and the league cannot come to an agreement on a new collective bargaining agreement.

The PHPA announced Monday that its ECHL membership has served a strike notice that would be effective Friday, when play is scheduled to resume following the holiday break. Players voted Friday to authorize their bargaining committee to call for a strike, executive director Brian Ramsay said Monday.

“Our members have made it very clear that they’ve had enough,” Ramsay said on a video call with reporters. “Unfortunately, this is a league that would rather bully us than bargain.”

The sides appeared no closer to a resolution Tuesday based on an update from Ramsay, even after he said the PHPA offered the option of reaching a settlement through mediation or arbitration.

“The ECHL responded within minutes, rejecting any interest in this solution and demanding ‘significant movement’ and concessions from the players,” Ramsay said in a released statement. “This approach continues to align with the increased threats our membership has faced over the past 18 hours.”

CBA talks began in January, with Ramsay accusing the league of unfair bargaining practices, including most recently contacting players directly with proposals, which have been reported to the National Labor Relations Board.

“This is a league that has taken almost a year to concede that we should be entitled to choose helmets that properly fit us and are safe,” Ramsay said. “This is the league that still supplies our members with used equipment. This is a league that shows no concern for players’ travels and in fact has said the nine-hour bus trip home should be considered your day off. We have had members this year spend 28 hours-plus on a bus to play back-to-back games on a Friday and Saturday night, only to be paid less than the referees who work those very same games.”

The ECHL posted details of its latest proposal on its website Monday, saying it calls to raise the salary cap 16.4% this season, with retroactive pay upon ratification, and increases in total player salaries in future years to pay players nearly 27% more than the current cap. The league said it has also offered larger per diems, mandatory day-off requirements and a 325-mile limit for travel between back-to-back games.

“Our approach will continue to balance the need to best support our players and maintain a sustainable business model that helps ensure the long-term success of our league so it remains affordable and accessible to fans,” the ECHL said, adding that the average ticket price is $21. “Negotiations have been progressing but not as quickly as we would like.

“We have reached a number of tentative agreements and remain focused on reaching a comprehensive new agreement that supports our players and the long-term health of every team in our league.”

Taking issue with the ECHL’s offer numbers, Ramsay said inflation would have players making less than the equivalent amount in 2018, prior to the pandemic. The league said a work stoppage would result in some games being postponed and players not being paid and losing housing and medical benefits that it pays for.

Ramsay called threats of players losing their housing if there’s a strike an unfair labor practice in itself.

“Consistently in the last six or eight weeks, teams trying to intimidate and bully our members, threaten our members with their jobs, with their housing, with their work visas if they’re from out of country — different tactics like that,” Ramsay said.

Jimmy Mazza, who played several seasons in the ECHL and is now on the negotiating committee, argued that owners do not know what it’s like to travel 29 hours in a bus or to be given a used helmet.

“The top level, you know that those players aren’t being treated that way, so why are they treating us that way?” Mazza said. “To us, it’s a little bit of a slap in the face with the way these negotiations have gone for a year, when only five days ago, we get a little bit of movement on a helmet issue when it should have been done a year ago.”

The ECHL, formerly known as the East Coast Hockey League and now going just by the acronym, is a North American developmental league that is two levels below the NHL, with the American Hockey League in between. There are 30 teams, 29 of which are in the U.S. and one in Canada in Trois-Rivières, Quebec.

The AHL and PHPA have been working under the terms of their most recent CBA, which expired Aug. 31. An AHL spokesperson said the sides are very close to a new agreement.

The NHL and the NHL Players’ Association earlier this year ratified a deal that ensures labor peace through 2030.

TORONTO — Max Domi scored the winner with 8:25 remaining to snap a 23-game goalless streak and added an assist to end the Toronto Maple Leafs‘ three-game slide with a 6-3 win against the Pittsburgh Penguins on Tuesday.

Domi danced around Pittsburgh newcomer Brett Kulak for the deciding goal, a few hours after Toronto general manager Brad Treliving gave coach Craig Berube a vote of confidence for the second time this season.

“I support Craig fully. When you go through rough stretches, that’s part of the business,” he said. “There isn’t a disconnect. We all need to be better, we all recognize that, but I think we got a really good coach.”

Treliving spoke a day after the club fired assistant coach Marc Savard following two losses in two days over the weekend.

“The players have responsibility and this doesn’t absolve anybody. This is not we throw somebody out and blame that person,” he said. “It’s a change that we could make to change the dynamic, change maybe a little bit of the play.”

William Nylander scored twice and added two assists, and Matias Maccelli and Steven Lorentz also scored for Toronto. Bobby McMann added an empty-netter to give Toronto its third win this season against the Penguins.

Bryan Rust, Rutger McGroarty and Anthony Mantha scored for the Penguins, who have lost nine of their last 10.

Nylander scored the icebreaker for his first in 11 games, midway through the first period. But Rust drew the Penguins even 44 seconds later, getting behind Nicolas Roy and Chris Tanev for a successful breakaway.

Tanev returned after a 23-game absence. He was stretchered off the ice after a collision on Nov. 1 in Philadelphia.

Toronto fired 31 shots on goal while the Penguins registered 32, with Joseph Woll picking up his sixth win in 11 starts. Pittsburgh goalie Stuart Skinner has yet to win in three starts, with 12 goals against since being traded by the Edmonton Oilers on Dec. 15.

Savard steered the Maple Leafs to the NHL’s worst power play (12 for 90 with four short-handed goals against), and on Tuesday, Toronto went 0 for 2 against Pittsburgh. Assistant coach Derek Lalonde has been tasked with fixing the team’s power-play struggles.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Former Georgia pass rusher Damon Wilson II says the school’s athletic department is attempting to illegally punish him for entering the transfer portal in a lawsuit filed Tuesday, part of an ongoing dispute that could have far-reaching implications on how player contracts work in college sports.

Wilson transferred last January to Missouri, where he was the team’s leader in sacks during the 2025 season, weeks after signing a term sheet for a 14-month name, image and likeness contract with Georgia’s booster collective. He collected $30,000 in an initial payment for what was a $500,000 deal before leaving the Bulldogs. Georgia filed a lawsuit last month claiming that Wilson owed the athletic department $390,000 in liquidated damages for leaving the team.

Wilson’s countersuit, filed in Missouri state court, claims that Georgia has “weaponized” a liquidated damages clause in an unenforceable way to “punish Wilson for entering the portal.”

Many schools have inserted liquidated damages clauses in their contracts with athletes since starting to pay players directly earlier this year. Several legal experts who reviewed player contracts for ESPN in the past say schools are inappropriately attempting to use liquidated damages as a de facto “buy out fee” for players who break a contract to transfer. Experts say liquidated damage fee must be tied to actual damages suffered by the party and can’t be used as punishment for breaking a contract. Wilson’s case is one of the first major tests of whether schools can effectively enforce these clauses to try to dissuade players from transferring.

“Georgia appears intent on making an example of someone, they just picked the wrong person,” said Jeff Jensen, one of Wilson’s attorneys. “Damon never had a contract with them. I don’t see how Georgia thinks intimidation and litigation will help their recruitment efforts — maybe players could bring lawyers with them to practice.”

Georgia spokesman Steve Drummond said the school had no comment because it involves pending litigation and referred to a previous statement he shared after Georgia filed its initial claims against Wilson.

“When the University of Georgia Athletic Association enters binding agreements with student-athletes, we honor our commitments and expect student-athletes to do the same,” Drummond said in early December.

The new lawsuit filed Tuesday claims that Drummond’s statement is defamatory and intended to harm Wilson’s reputation. The suit also claims that Georgia, the Classic City Collective and the collective’s operators committed tortious interference and civil conspiracy against Wilson.

The lawsuit states that Georgia officials told coaches at other football programs that Wilson had a “$1.2 million buyout” in an alleged attempt to dissuade other schools from recruiting him.

Wilson’s lawyers argue that the three-page term sheet he signed last December is not legally binding because it isn’t a full contract. The document, which was shared as part of Georgia’s lawsuit, states that it will “be used to create a legal binding document.”

Wilson and his attorneys have yet to file a response to the school’s claim, which was filed in Georgia and asks a judge to force both parties to settle their dispute in arbitration. State judges in both cases will have to parse through the case to determine who has jurisdiction to make a ruling.

Wilson will play in the Gator Bowl this Saturday with Missouri to finish his junior season.