NEW YORK CITY, NY (NEWS1130) – The NHL and NHLPA are set to meet at an undisclosed location in New York today.

It wasn’t immediately determined yesterday whether today’s bargaining session would be conducted by just NHL deputy commissioner Bill Daly and NHLPA special counsel Steve Fehr or if a larger group — perhaps including NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman and NHLPA executive director Donald Fehr — would also take part.

Daly and Fehr met on Saturday. Both sides said the negotiations were good, leading to optimism a deal could be reached soon.

So, what are the chances of getting a deal done? Apparently pretty good, according to Sportsnet’s Doug MacLean.

“If you’re fighting over $3.3-billion — a lot of money — but I think to keep momentum going; there’s going to be give and take on both sides here. Both the owners and the players want to play, and they want a deal done and they sense a deal right now,” MacLean says.

Bettman and Donald Fehr haven’t sat down face-to-face since the middle of October, when each side turned down offers.

The best-case scenario for the NHL right now is a shortened season that begins on Dec. 1. This would give the league and its players a little more than two weeks to sign-off on a new collective bargaining agreement and open training camps that would last roughly seven days.

The labour dispute, which began Sept. 16, has forced all games from Oct. 11 through Nov. 30 to be called off. The Winter Classic to be played at Michigan Stadium between Detroit and Toronto was also cancelled.

The average salary lost every hour during this lockout is over $478,000, adding up to more than $200-million so far.