For over 20 years the EA Sports NHL series has dominated the hockey video game world with its realistic and fun gameplay coupled with year-by-year innovation.

The annual announcement of who will be that year's cover boy for the game has always been a fun debate for fans as NHL enters its 22nd season. For NHL 13, EA Sports is changing the way its cover athlete is chosen. Instead of being selected in-house, fans will have the opportunity to decide who gets the honor.

Beginning today and ending June 4, puckheads will be able to vote from a list of 60 players leading up to the announcement of the cover winner on June 20 during the NHL Awards show in Las Vegas.

Here's how the three rounds of voting will break down:

March 29 — April 11: Round of 60: Two players from each team have been chosen and will go head-to-head to determine one representative from all 30 clubs. Two wild cards*, plus the 30 winners will advance. (*wild card selections made by EA)

April 12 — April 22: Round of 32: Of the 32 survivors, voting will go leaderboard style with the top 16 overall vote getters moving on.

April 24 — June 4: Round of 16: Here we move into a round-by-round bracket-style tournament until two remain and the winner is announced at the NHL Awards show.

Voting will take place at NHL.com/CoverVote and fans can do so an unlimited number of times. A Twitter hashtag, #NHL13Cover, will also track the cover athlete tournament discussion. Updates and other content will also show up on the EA SPORTS NHL Facebook page.

So which 60 players made the cut? Join us after the jump.

Here are the Eastern Conference matchups:

Bruins: Tuukka Rask vs. Tyler Seguin

Canadiens: P.K. Subban vs. Tomas Plekanec

Capitals: Brooks Laich vs. John Carlson

Devils: Ilya Kovalchuk vs. Adam Larsson

Flyers: Claude Giroux vs. Scott Hartnell

Hurricanes: Eric Staal vs. Jeff Skinner

Islanders: John Tavares vs. Michael Grabner

Jets: Evander Kane vs. Andrew Ladd

Lightning: Steven Stamkos vs. Victor Hedman

Maple Leafs: Phil Kessel vs. Tyler Bozak

Panthers: Stephen Weiss vs. Tomas Fleischmann

Penguins: Evgeni Malkin vs. Marc-Andre Fleury

Rangers: Henrik Lundqvist vs. Brad Richards

Sabres: Derek Roy vs. Thomas Vanek

Senators: Erik Karlsson vs. Jason Spezza

Eric Staal and Steven Stamkos are the only ones in the East that have already appeared on a cover in North America.

Here now are the matchups in the Western Conference:

Avalanche: Matt Duchene vs. Gabriel Landeskog

Blackhawks: Patrick Sharp vs. Duncan Keith

Blue Jackets: R.J. Umberger vs. Ryan Johansen

Blues: T.J. Oshie vs. David Perron

Canucks: Henrik Sedin vs. Alex Burrows

Coyotes: Shane Doan vs. Keith Yandle

Ducks: Corey Perry vs. Jonas Hiller

Flames: Mikael Backlund vs. Matt Stajan

Kings: Anze Kopitar vs. Drew Doughty

Oilers: Jordan Eberle vs. Taylor Hall

Predators: David Legwand vs. Pekka Rinne

Red Wings: Pavel Datsyuk vs. Jimmy Howard

Sharks: Logan Couture vs. Brent Burns

Stars: Loui Eriksson vs. Jamie Benn

Wild: Mikko Koivu vs. Niklas Backstrom

Lots of youth in the West. Who's up for a Pavel Datsyuk campaign?

Looking at the 60 players, one of them will end up as the NHL 13 cover boy. Who do you think will end up with the winning vote?

Follow Sean Leahy on Twitter at @Sean_Leahy