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NBC Releases NHL Regular-Season TV Schedule

J

Joseph_Gallant

Guest
NBC Sports has released the schedule for their 2005/2006 regular-season NHL coverage.

Although the new NBC/NHL contract gives NBC the right to broadcast seven regular-season games each year, only six will be broadcast by any one affiliate, likely due to the break the league will take in mid-February so that it's players can compete at the men's hockey tournament during the Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy.

There will be eighteen regular-season games in total, all of which will be broadcast on a regional basis.

A few highlights:

* Detroit, Philadelphia, Colorado, Dallas (all four of which should be championship contendors) and the New York Rangers (who may be lucky to make the playoffs, but do have the advantage of being in the number-one TV market) will each be seen four times. No team will have more than four regular-season games in ther NBC package.

* Pittsburgh (featuring rookie sensation Sidney Crosby) will be seen three times. It's my guess that only one of those three games (January 21st, when they host Philadelphia) would have been on NBC had Crosby not been drafted by the Pens. Besides Pittsburgh, my hometown Boston Bruins also appear three times during the regular-season.

* Los Angeles and St. Louis will be seen twice on NBC. Both of Los Angeles' regular-season telecasts will be seen only on the West Coast (and presumably, Alaska and Hawaii).

* San Jose (another legitimate Stanley Cup contendor), Minnesota, the New York Islanders, Atlanta, Anaheim, and 2004 Stanley Cup champion Tampa Bay will each be seen once on NBC during the regular-season.

* Continuing a recent tradition, no Canadian-based teams will be seen in any regular-season telecasts. Likely, it's because games between a U.S.-based team and a Canadian-based club would only do well in the ratings in the U.S. city whose local team played in it. As an example, had NBC included a game between the Boston Bruins and the Montreal Canadiens, it would have done well in Boston, but not anywhere else in the region (which likely would have been just New England and upstate New York except for Albany) the game was shown in.

I was surprised Tamps Bay would be seen only once on NBC during the regular-season. I thought that the Lightning might get three NBC appearances, especially if they were playing the Florida (Miami) Panthers on a couple of the dates that NBC has regular-season games. The Tampa Bay/Florida matchups would have been good regional telecasts for the state of Florida.

But Tampa Bay is a smaller market than most of the other U.S. cities with NHL teams. It's no accident that except for Pittsburgh, the teams that will have three or more regular-season games on NBC are in major United States television markets. Regional games involving major-market teams will often boost the overall national numbers higher than games with smaller-market teams.

Although neither team will likely make the postseason, I think NBC is secretly wishing for a New York Rangers/Los Angeles Kings Stanley Cup Final. That way, the two top TV markets will be involved. The truth is that except for the Super Bowl, TV ratings for the championship finals in the major pro sports depend greatly on the market size of participating teams.
 
Wow, no Hawks on the schedule.

I guess NBC decided that the third largest market isn't big on hockey anymore. And you know what, their probably right.

Dollar Bill Wirtz has stuck it to Chicago fans for over 2 decades. NBC figures if the owner of the team wont televize the games, why should they?

With the exception of the sweet new NHL logo, I'm not really that excited myself.



nhl_trans_logo.gif
 
I too am surprised that the Chicago Blackhawks, being in the number-three U.S. TV market and one of the "original six" teams, was left off NBC's regular-season TV schedule. I thought that due to Chicago's size as a TV market, three or four Hawk games would have been regionally televised on NBC.

I thought that were under the new NHL/NBC contract, were the network to select a Hawks' game as one of it's regional NHL telecasts for a particular Saturday, even if the game were a home contest from the United Center, the game would be seen on WMAQ-5 there.

Perhaps NBC agrees with most hockey experts, who are picking the Hawks to miss the playoffs, likely finish last in the Midwest Division, and have a shot at finishing with the worst record in the league.

BTW, according to the 2005/2006 NHL league schedule, the Hawks do play on three dates when NBC has regional NHL telecasts: February 4th and April 8th (both dates at Nashville) and April 15th (at Columbus). Both Nashville and Columbus are considered "small market" teams, so NBC may have decided to pass on those three games to carry other games that each feature two "large market" clubs, or games with Pittsburgh (a "small market" team with rookie phenom Sidney Crosby, who according to the hype is supposed to be a combination of Maurice "Rocket" Richard, Gordie Howe, Bobby Orr, Wayne Gretzky and Mario Lemieux all rolled into one).
 
Aside from losing Khabiboulin at goal, the Bolts return most of their key personnel that, despite what the Northeast Media would like you to believe, will have a damn good shot at keeping the cup.

One regional appearance for the leagues Cup Champions. Disgraceful.

Thankfully, Sun Sports in Florida will provide its usual excellent coverage...and if need be, I ll find a way to watch the CBC coverage...um..if the strike ever ends up there.

At least OLN has the Bolts on five times. Many thanks to Comcast.
 
Studiotwenty:

I actually agree with you that Tampa Bay got short-changed by NBC.

The Lightning should have been scheduled for three or four games, which at the least would be seen in Central Florida and the home region of the opposing team.

What I hope the NHL will do in the future is schedule more "rivalry" games between U.S. teams (Tampa Bay/Florida, Rangers/Islanders, Philadelphia/Pittsburgh, Los Angeles/Anaheim, etc.) as Saturday matinees on dates when NBC would be carrying NHL games. Maybe there could be a couple of such Saturdays starting in 2006/2007 when NBC can carry five or six regional NHL "rivalry games".
 
Life would be much easier if we could get the CBC in the US.
We could watch The National, non-jinogistic Olympic coverage, and hockey done right.<P ID="signature">______________
WCBS = We're Crazy Buffoons and Schmucks
<a href=http://chuck.spotteddogs.org/tv/>Spotted Dog TV Talk - for all your non-news TV Talk</a></P>
 
> Life would be much easier if we could get the CBC in the US.
>
> We could watch The National, non-jinogistic Olympic
> coverage, and hockey done right.
>
So there might be a chance that the Predators might be on NBC

this year ?
 
> Life would be much easier if we could get the CBC in the US.
>
> We could watch The National, non-jinogistic Olympic
> coverage, and hockey done right.
>

It gets pretty jingoistic if a Canadian is involved in the sport. I remember Tom Dolan and Eric Namesnik (college teammates) going silver-gold in the 1996 400m swimming, all focus was on the Canadian bronze winner.

There's so many fewer Canadian atheletes at the games than U.S. ones, so it seems less jingoistic.


--Mike
 
> * Detroit, Philadelphia, Colorado, Dallas (all four of which
> should be championship contendors) and the New York Rangers
> (who may be lucky to make the playoffs, but do have the
> advantage of being in the number-one TV market) will each be
> seen four times. No team will have more than four
> regular-season games in ther NBC package.

Neither Detroit or Colorado are championship contenders any more. Detroit lost most of their 'D' and a lot of their forward depth to salary cuts, while Colorado lost Forsberg, Foote, Selanne and Kariya. Getting to the playoffs will be a good enough accomplishment for either of these teams.


--Mike
 
I'm sure WFLA-TV News Channel 8 (Tampa's NBC Affiliate) is pretty pissed about getting to televise only 1 Tampa Bay Lightning game all regular season long. I'm pleasently surprised that Comcast owned OLN didn't go crazy with televising mostly Comcast Sports Net televised teams which are the Flyers, Capitals, and Blackhawks. And about CBC, I've been saying this for a good while since I'm a die-hard American hockey fan, that since we have BBC America, why don't we have CBC America or CBC US with Hockey Night In Canada included.
 
Bad enough that former VP Al Gores "Current" tv, aimed at wandering twenty sometings replaced the former CBC Newsworld International, but the CBC itself is having labor (labour) problems of its own....

I would enjoy seeing CBC news and sports programming here...The Stanley Cup coverage was light years ahead of ESPN/ABC. The now departed Chris Cuthbert was superb in his play by play, and I already miss Don Cherry.

(Cuthbert was the first casualty of the labour problems, as his contract was cut. He is now plying his trade at cable TSN)
 
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