NBC’s Post-Olympics NHL Ratings No Better Than Pre-Olympics NHL Ratings

Remember that good feeling everyone had after the men’s Gold Medal game between Canada and the United States?  Remember how the excitement generated from that game was going to carry over to the National Hockey League, once the Olympics were done, and how NHL television viewers would increase in numbers for the remainder of the season, and beyond?

Yeah, ain’t gonna happen.

Exactly one week, one stinkin’ week, after that epic showdown between the Yanks and Canucks drew an unheard of (well, unheard of for a hockey game) 17.6 rating overnight, and a 15.2 final rating, the Red Wings/Blackhawks tilt, NBC’s NHL Game of the Week, drew a meager 1.2 overnight rating.

Sure, that 1.2 rating is better than last year’s Bruins/Rangers game (1.0 rating), but somewhat lower than the Pens/Capitals game on February 7, the final NBC broadcast heading into the Olympic break (1.3 rating).  Of course, the February 7 game had the added benefit of a showdown between the leagues top two stars in Sidney Crosby and Alex Ovechkin.

But still, this doesn’t bode well for fans hoping to see NHL stars at the 2014 Winter Olympics.  Increased viewership, courtesy of the Olympics, is pretty well the only benefit the NHL and the team owners receive from NHL participation.  And it’s fairly obvious from these latest numbers that casual fans that get caught up in the excitement of Olympic hockey, realize that the NHL product is far less entertaining an animal, and would rather watch Golden Girls reruns on a Sunday afternoon, than sit through an NHL game.

[Sports Media Watch]