NHL TV ratings 2023/2024

[Reaser]

The Western Conference game being at 1:30pm local time is certainly a choice. Choosing 2 teams that didnt make the playoffs last year, also a choice.

The late game being Lottery Chicago vs Relocated ArizUtah Coyockey Club is also an interesting choice

Could see Chicago @ Utah ESPN opening night coming a mile away. Not that it makes it a great matchup, but seemed pretty obvious in advance. I had that a week ago, well I had Colorado or Chicago @ Utah but figured Avs-VGK for TNT opener since TNT always has the Avs in the late game, which is exactly how that played out.

Blues-Kraken is absurd, for all the reasons. ESPN's want for an opening day/night tripleheader.

 

[Reaser]

Couple things that stood out:

-- Tuesday October 22 is clearly another Frozen Frenzy (presumably with ESPN tripleheader and Frozen Frenzy on espn2 again.)

-- Bruins aren't playing at their traditional matinee 1pmET time on Black Friday. Hosting the Pens at 6pmET which obviously makes that a TNT game.

-- I have ABC projected at 20 Saturday games. But that includes the Stadium Series which doesn't have a time yet (Sportsnet has it listed at 6pmET but master schedule and ESPN have it TBD) and also includes a final Saturday of the regular season tripleheader that they've been doing but that'd make Utah-Dallas the primetime game which would be an odd choice. Also is the week before Easter so ABC could be doing their traditional airing of the Ten Commandments that night. Regardless, based on dates/times, ABC looks to have a similar Saturday regular season NHL schedule to last year (19 games.)

-- Regular season ends on a Thursday again. This past season the networks decided late that they wanted playoff games that weekend which made for a mess for Game 1s scheduling. Advance notice this time but still doing the same schedule, ha.

 

[DaBadGuy7]

The Amazon Monday Night games are a prelude imo to them getting exclusive rights to games in both US and Canada in the future. It’s a very unique and forward thinking media deal that the NHL won’t pass up with the money and reach they have.

 

[Reaser]

The Amazon Monday Night games are a prelude imo to them getting exclusive rights to games in both US and Canada in the future. It’s a very unique and forward thinking media deal that the NHL won’t pass up with the money and reach they have.

I said similar a few weeks ago on X (twitter). A cross-border package on Monday nights. It makes too much sense.

I even went into scheduling, speculating that it'd make sense to do all matchups CAN based team v. U.S. based team. Which was interesting to see when the Prime MNH schedule came out today that 21 of their 26 games were like that, or only 5 All-Canadian matchups.

 

[Kirk Van Houten]

The Western Conference game being at 1:30pm local time is certainly a choice. Choosing 2 teams that didnt make the playoffs last year, also a choice.


The late game being Lottery Chicago vs Relocated ArizUtah Coyockey Club is also an interesting choice

I actually expected more a Blackhawks v Sharks game than Utah for opening week but the 7PM game will be big

 

[rojac]

I said similar a few weeks ago on X (twitter). A cross-border package on Monday nights. It makes too much sense.

I even went into scheduling, speculating that it'd make sense to do all matchups CAN based team v. U.S. based team. Which was interesting to see when the Prime MNH schedule came out today that 21 of their 26 games were like that, or only 5 All-Canadian matchups.

That's actually a decrease in the number US-CAN games compared to this past season. Looking at Sportsnet's national schedule for 23-24, I count 25 CAN-US games and only 1 CAN-CAN game. Here's the link:

Sportsnet announces national broadcast schedule for 2023-24 NHL season

Sportsnet and SN NOW are bringing wall-to-wall coverage of the upcoming NHL season, and on Tuesday, the network unveiled the full national schedule of games, with more than 150 exclusive national English-language matchups across Sportsnet's TV channels and SN NOW.

www.sportsnet.ca

 

[Reaser]

That's actually a decrease in the number US-CAN games compared to this past season. Looking at Sportsnet's national schedule for 23-24, I count 25 CAN-US games and only 1 CAN-CAN game. Here's the link:

Yeah, I was talking about the hypothetical -but certainly possible- future of an exclusive say roughly 25-games or so worldwide rights Prime MNH package. Since it'd be born out of the Canadian MNH package it'd make sense to have each game feature a Canadian team. For numerous reasons, including that it'd do better on/in 'Prime Canada' during MNF season.

 

[rojac]

Yeah, I was talking about the hypothetical -but certainly possible- future of an exclusive say roughly 25-games or so worldwide rights Prime MNH package. Since it'd be born out of the Canadian MNH package it'd make sense to have each game feature a Canadian team. For numerous reasons, including that it'd do better on/in 'Prime Canada' during MNF season.

Your post was talking about the schedule for Prime this year had only 5 CAN-CAN games which felt like you were saying that this was a significant decrease and I was just pointing out that it was actually an increase in CAN-CAN games.

 

[Reaser]

-CANADA-

NHL Draft Round 1 viewership on TVA Sports had an AMA of 391k

 

[Reaser]

-CANADA-

NHL Draft Round 1 Viewership

SN: 499k

With the 391k on TVAS Canada had an AMA of 890k for Friday night's draft coverage.

With 502k on ESPN in the U.S. that makes for a combined North America average audience of 1.392M for Round 1 of the 2024 NHL Draft.