Taking a year off, or more, will only push the league further off the radar screen.

Between shifts of a pickup game at the Denver rink where the Avalanche used to practice, fan Don Cameron called the cancellation “a shame.”

“When they come back, it’s not going to be as easy to pay for a $90 season ticket,” he said.

Not to mention how difficult it will be for all the ushers, trainers, officials, Zamboni drivers and businesses near arenas that will continue to be affected.

“If you want to know how I feel, I’ll summarize it in one word — terrible,” Bettman said.

But he added that the sides would keep working toward an agreement.

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Goodenow stressed that the players had already given a lot of ground. “Every offer by the players moved in the owners’ direction,” he said.

“Keep one thing perfectly clear,” Goodenow said. “The players never asked for more money — they just asked for a marketplace.”

The league and players’ union traded a flurry of proposals and letters Tuesday night, but could never agree on a cap. The players proposed $49 million per team; the owners said $42.5 million. But a series of conditions in both proposals made the offers further apart than just $6.5 million per team.

“We weren’t as close as people were speculating,” Bettman said.

And now they’ll have to start over.

“I think it’s a fresh start and everything is off the table,” Goodenow said. “It’s a totally new environment. That much is for sure.”

Before Monday, the idea of a salary cap was a deal-breaker for the players’ association but the union gave in and said it would accept one when the NHL dropped its insistence that there be a link between revenues and player costs.

That still wasn’t enough to end the lockout that started on Sept. 16 and ultimately wiped out the entire 1,230-game schedule that was to begin in October and run through the Stanley Cup finals in June.

And now, those concessions are off the table.

“By necessity, we have to go back to linkage since no one knows what the damage to the sport will be,” Bettman said.