NBC earned a 1.6 overnight for Saturday’s Rangers-Capitals NHL Eastern Conference Semifinal Game Four from 12:30-3:15pm ET, which led into pre-race coverage of the Kentucky Derby. The net also earned a 1.0 overnight for the Kings’ series-clinching Game Four win over the Blues yesterday afternoon. There were no comparable NHL Stanley Cup Playoff games on NBC during the comparable weekend last year (THE DAILY). In Tampa, Tom Jones wrote there has been "plenty to love about this year's race to the Stanley Cup." No one "makes playoff hockey more exciting" than NBC's Mike Emrick, who "never makes himself bigger than the game he is calling." His "uncanny sense of timing and right balance of emotion make a dramatic game more dramatic" (TAMPA BAY TIMES, 5/6). Jones, in a separate piece, writes NBC's Liam McHugh is "well on his way to being a fixture for years to come" during the Stanley Cup Playoffs. McHugh is "calm and controlled, yet enthusiastic and engaging." He is "especially quick and skilled managing NBC's large hockey personalities," including Mike Milbury, Keith Jones and Jeremy Roenick (TAMPA BAY TIMES, 5/7).
