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WJC: Tournament popularity outside Canada

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teris said:
The WJC is an afterthought among the masses in Finland and it's going to stay that way as long as

1) the games aren't on TV for free
2) the tournament is held in NA almost every other year meaning the games are on too late

Number 1 might change now with the rights up for grabs but number 2 is going to kill any momentum it'll ever gather.
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Even with 1 and 2 happening the WJC will always be an afterthought, as it should be. It's only juniors, a rather mediocre tournament even when compared to the WHC. Self-appointed "connoisseurs" should realise that.
 
hockey in general is not popular in denmark. The world Championships is watched by a decent amount of people..The wjc is not even shown. well three of denmarks games were shown on a online pay channel. only a few hardcores watched.
 
tade said:
It's pretty popular here in Czech republic. That's for sure.
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That is definitely not for sure.

The only numbers I found out are from WJC 2012 Czech Republic - USA (the game where Mrázek dominated), it was played at 21:00 CET and on the 30th of December, so basically the best possible time slot if we are talking about overseas WJC and it was watched by 273k people, for comparison EHT match Czech Republic - Finland two weeks earlier was watched by 265k people. And WHC 2011 at Slovakia had average viewership of 1 million people.

The thing is most people don't know 90% of players on the roster, the games are being played late and we are not really that great in WJC. Yes hardcore hockey fans will watch it and casual fans may turn it on, when nothing else is in the TV, but that is all. But I guess it is still the most popular not senior tournament, so good for hockey.
 
For the avid hockey fans, I know that a good amount of them watch it here in the states. Here in NJ, I would talk about the 2013 games and I would find a good amount of my friends who are hockey fans woke up at 6Am to watch the USA games then, a lot more than I anticipated.

The casual fan might tune in, usually when someone else mentions it, but aside from that, the coverage here is small outside of NHL.com and your hockey websites. Even if the US medals I doubt it gets a mention, depending on how it happens and if nothing else interesting happened that day, you might get lucky and see it on ESPN.
 
This tournament gets no coverage in America. In fact if i was not a memeber of HFboards i would not know about it or care about it.

I still find it very bizarre that professional teams allow for their players to leave their team to play in this tournament. That makes no sense to me. That would never happen in any other sport
 
I'm in Massachusetts and I'm always disappointed at the small following. I have 3 or 4 friends who watch it pretty carefully; another 4-5 who watch when convenient but LOTS of friends associated with hockey who have almost no interest. I cant understand how they can watch a game and not get hooked but I'vebeen trying to sell it for years and it isnt taking.
 
In all seriousness, this tournament is 100% TSN generated hype.

The fact that they have been able to whip Canadians into a patriotic frenzy about "our game" to the point that we will pay $400+ to watch a bunch of juniors play in a tournament very few follow outside of Canada is pathetic.

I went to some games this year because I am a hardcore hockey fan, but I didn't pay more than $15 for a ticket.
 
Watch for the Yeti said:
There is a following of the WJHC in certain parts of the US, and they all have a deep culture of elite collegiate hockey. New England and the Upper Midwest do see a following of the WJHC, albeit a small one. Outside of that, many people have no clue what icing is in hockey, nevermind have any interest in following the World Juniors.

I could see it becoming more popular if the tournament was hyped by a major network like ESPN, but it will never happen so the tournament will always be irrelevant. I like it so that's all that counts ;)
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I think if you were to ask the average sports fan in the Northern US about the College Football Playoffs, they could tell you Oregon plays Florida State, Alabama is playing Ohio State and they would be aware of Jameis Winston, Marcus Mariota, Urban Meyer and Nick Saban. They could probably tell you Ohio State is down to their 3rd team QB. They could tell you Jim Harbaugh just got the Michigan job.

They could tell you about the NFL playoffs, that everyone should be afraid of the Steelers, that Carolina made the playoffs with a losing record, the wildcard games are this weekend. They would probably know all about Tom Brady, Andrew Luck, Peyton Manning, Aaron Rodgers, and Ndamakong Suh.

If you asked them about Jack Eichel, Noah Hanifin, Sonny Milano or Dylan Larkin or asked about the New Year's Eve game between Canada and the US teams, you would get a blank look.

Why? The NHL Network is the only broadcast outlet and it is not on the standard offering of most cable systems. You need to order a premium tier to get it, while ESPN, Fox Sports and NBC Sports are on standard tiers. Due to that many US sports fans might watch the Winter Classic yet never even know there is a World Junior Hockey Championship.
 
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TaketheCannoli said:
I think if you were to ask the average sports fan in the Northern US about the College Football Playoffs, they could tell you Oregon plays Florida State, Alabama is playing Ohio State and they would be aware of Jameis Winston, Marcus Mariota, Urban Meyer and Nick Saban. They could probably tell you Ohio State is down to their 3rd team QB. They could tell you Jim Harbaugh just got the Michigan job.

They could tell you about the NFL playoffs, that everyone should be afraid of the Steelers, that Carolina made the playoffs with a losing record, the wildcard games are this weekend. They would probably know all about Tom Brady, Oliver Luck, Peyton Manning, Aaron Rodgers, and Ndamakong Suh.

If you asked them about Jack Eichel, Noah Hanifin, Sonny Milano or Dylan Larkin or asked about the New Year's Eve game between Canada and the US teams, you would get a blank look.

Why? The NHL Network is the only broadcast outlet and it is not on the standard offering of most cable systems. You need to order a premium tier to get it, while ESPN, Fox Sports and NBC Sports are on standard tiers. Due to that many US sports fans might watch the Winter Classic yet never even know there is a World Junior Hockey Championship.
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Spot on.
 
Urbanskog said:
Hockey is probably the only sport in which not all the qualified players are allowed to participate by the team (Barkov, McKinnon, Draisaitl etc...).
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It is a tournament that runs during the professional season. Teams don't care how canada or latvia does. They care how the Hurricanes and the Stars do.
 
GKJ said:
People don't give enough credit to the European countries. Last year for the Gold Medal Game, Sweden had an 8-hour pre-game show. 8. As in more than 7. We don't even get that for the Super Bowl in America.
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8 hours for a pre-game show..WTF we didn't even come close to that even for the 2010 Olympic Final on CTV. That's a crazy amount of time to talk about 1 game.
 
TaketheCannoli said:
I think if you were to ask the average sports fan in the Northern US about the College Football Playoffs, they could tell you Oregon plays Florida State, Alabama is playing Ohio State and they would be aware of Jameis Winston, Marcus Mariota, Urban Meyer and Nick Saban. They could probably tell you Ohio State is down to their 3rd team QB. They could tell you Jim Harbaugh just got the Michigan job.

They could tell you about the NFL playoffs, that everyone should be afraid of the Steelers, that Carolina made the playoffs with a losing record, the wildcard games are this weekend. They would probably know all about Tom Brady, Oliver Luck, Peyton Manning, Aaron Rodgers, and Ndamakong Suh.

If you asked them about Jack Eichel, Noah Hanifin, Sonny Milano or Dylan Larkin or asked about the New Year's Eve game between Canada and the US teams, you would get a blank look.

Why? The NHL Network is the only broadcast outlet and it is not on the standard offering of most cable systems. You need to order a premium tier to get it, while ESPN, Fox Sports and NBC Sports are on standard tiers. Due to that many US sports fans might watch the Winter Classic yet never even know there is a World Junior Hockey Championship.
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Is Oliver Luck Andrew's brother, or a character from a Dickens novel I have yet to read?
 
Jtown said:
It is a tournament that runs during the professional season. Teams don't care how canada or latvia does. They care how the Hurricanes and the Stars do.
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Of course the teams only care about themselves, you however said that hockey is the only sport in which some teams let their players leave for the tournament. If this was soccer, every team would be forced to let their players leave.
 
Admittedly as a Canadian I can see why it wouldn't be very popular in countries like Latvia, Denmark, even in Switzerland and Czech Republic. When was the last time the Czech's were contenders for a gold? 2000? 2001? Outside of Mrazek's incredible tournament a few years ago there are countries outside of the Big 4 that haven't had a lick of success in this tournament in a long time, so why would people tune in? Again not to rip the Czech's but unless you're a diehard fan why would you watch this team play? This is supposed to be one of the better teams they've put together and yet they still almost went to relegation. This is also an issue of player development an until federations start doing a better job, people in Europe aren't going to pay much attention to a junior tournament when they can watch their domestic teams instead.
 
Meh I've only been at one tournament outside of Canada (Malmo) and the support and interest for those games was solid. Outside of that though I really doubt much if at all.

Times suck for the European countries that might be interested when the games are in NA and the United States does not know or care about it whatsoever (well of course a tiny percentage of you do but I would guess 99.99% of Americans have no clue what the traditional New Year's game is at all).

The complete and total apathy outside of Canada is what really killed my buzz for the tourney over the years.

If no one is interested or cares outside of you, how can you claim any kind of prestige for winning medals?

Would anyone care if the U.S. had won 5 straight World Wheelchair Basketball tournaments? A hypothetical example but it's basically the equivalent of when Canadians hold up WJHC medals as some sort of international sports cred.

This is all TSN hype and push. Plain and simple.
 
Urbanskog said:
Of course the teams only care about themselves, you however said that hockey is the only sport in which some teams let their players leave for the tournament. If this was soccer, every team would be forced to let their players leave.
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north american sport. hockey basketball football baseball.
 
I still get a laugh when someone mentions McDavid carrying "the weight of a country's expectations on his back".

What a joke. How can expectations be so high to win a tournament no one outside of your own country cares about or has even heard of?

Love hockey, love watching prospects, but have always despised TSNs encouragement of hockey based jingoism in this country.
 
FuriousSenator said:
Meh I've only been at one tournament outside of Canada (Malmo) and the support and interest for those games was solid. Outside of that though I really doubt much if at all.

Times suck for the European countries that might be interested when the games are in NA and the United States does not know or care about it whatsoever (well of course a tiny percentage of you do but I would guess 99.99% of Americans have no clue what the traditional New Year's game is at all).

The complete and total apathy outside of Canada is what really killed my buzz for the tourney over the years.

If no one is interested or cares outside of you, how can you claim any kind of prestige for winning medals?

Would anyone care if the U.S. had won 5 straight World Wheelchair Basketball tournaments? A hypothetical example but it's basically the equivalent of when Canadians hold up WJHC medals as some sort of international sports cred.

This is all TSN hype and push. Plain and simple.
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Some european countries don't care cause they suck..plain and simple. How can you get involved emotionally into a tournament when you may have a chance at a gold once every 5-10 years...That falls on hockey federations not TSN or Canada or HC or anything like that. If TSN wants to build a tournament they pretty much built then they can.
 
Falafel said:
I still get a laugh when someone mentions McDavid carrying "the weight of a country's expectations on his back".

What a joke. How can expectations be so high to win a tournament no one outside of your own country cares about or has even heard of.

Love hockey, love watching prospects, but have always despised TSNs encouragement of hockey based jingoism in this country.
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What do you mean? :sarcasm:

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