NHL Still Searching For Ways To Juice TV Ratings

Daly Says NHL Has Good Prospects For TV Ratings Growth

Versus, whose NHL viewership this regular season increased 31% over last season, has “lost 6[%] of its postseason audience, reaching an average of 267,720 a game,” according to Richard Sandomir of the N.Y. TIMES. Nationally, NBC’s regular-season average viewership of 1.34 million is “45[%] of the 2.9 million” on Fox 11 years ago, and on Sunday, NBC’s National Heads-Up Poker Championship drew better than Flames-Red Wings Game Two, which followed the show. NHL Deputy Commissioner Bill Daly: “Is there a prospect for monumental growth in ratings? No. Do we have what we consider good growth prospects in this environment? Yes.” Daly said with the Rangers, Islanders and Devils in the playoffs, “It’s nice to have a revival in hockey in New York.” Sandomir notes the rating in N.Y. for Saturday’s Rangers-Thrashers Game Two on NBC was 38% less than that of the NASCAR Nextel Cup Samsung 500 on Sunday. But the number of HHs watching the Devils on FSNY has increased from an average of 17,000 in the regular season to 58,000 for the playoffs. Islanders playoff games on FSNY have averaged 51,000 HHs, up from 10,000 for the regular season. And the lone Rangers playoff game on MSG was seen in 103,000 HHs, up from a regular season average of 48,000 (N.Y. TIMES, 4/18).

SHARKS: In San Jose, John Ryan notes tonight’s Sharks-Predators Game Four will air only on Versus. The Sharks and FSN Bay Area “decided last week to defer to Versus because of FSN’s crowded schedule.” The Warriors can clinch a playoff berth with a win over the Trail Blazers tonight, so FSN will show the Warriors “instead of moving them to overflow channel FSN Plus, which is only on digital cable” (SAN JOSE MERCURY NEWS, 4/18).