TodayNHL making a TV comeback?
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A few weeks ago, we had a friend from out of town coming to visit. He sent us an email wondering if we got the cable network Versus, because he wanted to watch the first game of the Stanley Cup finals.
Our response: People still watch hockey?
Evidently they do, and more than just our Pittsburgh Penguins-lovin’ friend. This year, for the first time since the 2004-’05 lockout cost the National Hockey League its season, postseason puck got a pretty healthy tune-in on Versus and NBC.
The decisive Game 6, won Wednesday night by the Detroit Red Wings, had the best rating among adults ages 18-to-49 since 2003. In other words, all the advertisers who bought time on NBC’s finals games actually reached more of the people they were after for the first time in years.
This six-game Stanley Cup series will be the highest-rated in at least four years, and it will nearly double the average for last year’s lame-o contest between the Anaheim Ducks and Ottawa Senators, which generated less buzz than gassed-out Zamboni.
So does this mean that viewers have finally forgiven the NHL for the lockout? That hockey has a chance of knocking off NASCAR as the nation’s No. 4 sport again? Or simply that no one felt like watching yet another “Price is Right” special Wednesday on CBS and stumbled onto hockey instead?
No one will know for sure until next season, which the league is already mega-hyping ("Hopefully this provides a launching point for future growth,” said NBC Sports president Ken Schanzer hours after the Red Wings won. “We can't wait for our season to begin, somewhere outdoors, next season.”).
Sorry to disappoint Schanzer, but I think part of the finals bump came because of the two teams that were playing, Detroit and Pittsburgh. Those are hockey towns, about a hundred times more so than the cities where the last three champs are from – Anaheim, Calif., Raleigh, N.C., and Tampa Bay, Fla. You can’t even make ice there in the winter.
Yet the hockey bump could also be part of a greater revival for sports TV ratings in 2008 after years and years of declines.
The Super Bowl drew its biggest audience ever in February. National Basketball Association postseason ratings have boomed one year after its finals also hit an all-time low last June. NASCAR ratings are up this year on Fox.
Even viewership for the WNBA has jumped this year compared to last. Heck, that, along with the hockey spike and the coming cicada invasion this summer, may have people screaming “end of the world” very soon.
I’m no psychologist, or even a sociologist, but I also think this trend tells us a little bit about the country’s psyche.
I believe that in uncertain times, which would describe our economy right now, people get a certain comfort from the familiar. And there’s nothing more familiar than vegging out and watching sports, even if it’s not a sport you usually follow.
It reminds you of years ago, when there were only 30 channels instead of 300 (or three channels, if you grew up pre-cable). Back then, you probably watched hockey even if you didn’t like it, simply because there was nothing else on.
I know I feel a wave of nostalgia every year at NBA finals time, even though I no longer watch, remembering those nights in high school when I stayed up extra late to watch every Michael Jordan jumper or B.J. Armstrong 3-pointer.
Given the fact that the Los Angeles Lakers and Boston Celtics, the most storied teams of the 1980s, are now facing off in the NBA finals, I wouldn’t be surprised to see a huge ratings rebirth there, either.
To answer our friend’s original question, yes, it turns out we do get Versus. If the economy hasn’t turned around by next fall, we may even use it to watch a few hockey games.
Toni Fitzgerald has covered the television industry for Media Life Magazine (www.medialifemagazine.com) for five years. You can reach her at tonifitz@yahoo.com
