43 NHL players test positive for COVID-19 during Phase 2 of Return To Play plan

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With Phase 3 of the National Hockey League's Return To Play plan officially underway on Monday, the league provided a final COVID-19 update for tests it ran during Phase 2.

In a league statement, the NHL announced that a total of 43 players tested positive for COVID-19 since June 8, with 30 of those players testing positive after reporting to their team's training/practice facilities for their voluntary, individualized workouts.

NHL statement on COVID-19 testing results: pic.twitter.com/lAkEQJ0B8N

— NHL Public Relations (@PR_NHL) July 13, 2020

The NHL says that it had in excess of 600 players that reported to their teams during Phase 2, and ended up conducting 4,934 COVID-19 tests.

Phase 3 of the league's Return To Play plan sees all 24 teams reporting to their home cities for nearly a two-week training camp to prepare for the official return of play on Saturday, Aug. 1 in their respective hub city. On Sunday, July 26, those 24 teams will travel to either Edmonton, Alberta (Western Conference teams) or Toronto, Ontario (Eastern Conference teams), where they will play in one exhibition game before the start of the Stanley Cup Qualifying Round and the seeding round-robin tournaments.

Stay tuned for the latest on this developing story...