The NHL Network carries the second half of the Original 6 matchup of Toronto and Chicago. Last time, the channel carried the TSN4 feed. That option is available Monday night, but will be blacked out for your humble narrator.
The Vancouver Canucks and Winnipeg Jets are on Hockey Night in Canada but not in their usual slots. The Canucks host Toronto at 4 pm local time while the Jets are in Edmonton at 9 pm local time. Both games will air on CBC.
City TV is back with a Canadian team as the Ottawa Senators are in Columbus on Saturday night.
Canadian based teams get Valentine's Day off, but Hometown Hockey from New Westminster, BC will be on Rogers Sportsnet at 7 pm Eastern. The NHL Network is not carrying the pregame; its Valentine's Day celebration involves no matinee rebroadcasts. That's not love for NHL fans.
The regional channels will have the Habs in Denver with Patrick Roy for a 6 pm local time start on Wednesday.
Rogers Sportsnet One has the Calgary Flames hosting Minnesota on Wednesday night.
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NHL Network
Monday
Toronto @ Chicago, 8:30p
Tape delayed
Friday Calgary @ San Jose, 2p
Tuesday Toronto @ Chicago, 4p
Thursday Montréal @ Colorado, 2p
Minnesota @ Calgary, 3p
CBC
Saturday
Toronto @ Vancouver, 7p
Winnipeg @ Edmonton, 10p
City
Saturday
Ottawa @ Columbus, 7p
Rogers Sportsnet
Wednesday
Montréal @ Colorado, 8p
Rogers Sportsnet One
Wednesday
Minnesota @ Calgary, 10p
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Turns out the first 2 hours of Hockey Day of Canada did air on the NHL Center Ice feed. Our standard has been relatively easy access: paying for NHL Center Ice does not count as easy access. In switching up the policy, the NHL gave no warning or promotion. If the goal was to get more Center Ice subscribers, the plan failed. This is the first time in recent memory that U.S. viewers had to pay extra for HDIC coverage. Epic fail.
If there is a free preview to come, then why not do it with momentum coming out of the break. If there isn't a free preview coming, why not?
The eggs in the marketing basket went to NHL.TV, which did not carry the Hockey Day in Canada coverage.
We did get Hockey Day of Canada coverage that followed the matinee game on the NHL Network. I appreciated the story on the Kamloops family that aired about 5:45 pm Eastern that shares my last name, right down to the spelling. Nice to know I have Canadian relatives.
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We knew Rogers moved better games to the regional Sportsnet channels and shifted City TV down the chart on Saturdays and moved Hometown Hockey to Rogers Sportsnet. But now we know the reasoning. Rogers president Scott Moore shared some insight with Steve Faguy of the Montréal Gazette.
While Rogers pushes for the idea "to put whatever games we can to the widest distribution," this season, “the second best game has moved to Sportsnet and the third best game has gone to City.”
The move has been "simply for a subscription play." Rogers may want to grow City TV but it's more important to get people to subscribe to the Rogers Sportsnet channels, especially in the era of CRTC pick-and-pay strategies.
Faguy reports that Sportsnet gets 72% of its revenue through subscriptions (75% including Sportsnet One, 360, and World) from 2013-2014 numbers submitted to the CRTC. According to numbers from the CRTC, in 2011, the number was 64% for the Sportsnet channels.
City TV survives mostly on U.S. shows with a few Canadian shows. City's pick-and-pay strategy relies very little on the NHL. But the shift means that Rogers will have to start over growing the relationship with City TV and hockey, and the CBC 4-year deal will almost certainly be extended. That assumes that over-the-air TV is important to Rogers 2-3 years down the road.
City TV is over the air, but mostly in 6 major markets: Toronto, Montréal, Vancouver, Winnipeg, Calgary, and Edmonton. Ottawa does have a OTA signal, a rebroadcaster of City Toronto, which doesn't carry the 6:30 pm Saturday pregame.
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The Toronto Maple Leafs have become good at trading bad contracts, managing to stick Columbus with David Clarkson for the long-term injured Nathan Horton.
Trading the expensive contract of Dion Phaneuf was amazing enough, but the Maple Leafs look like they got some good talent back from the Ottawa Senators.
Milan Michalek has been an important cog for the Sens but Tobias Lindberg might be the key for the Maple Leafs.
Ottawa has struggled on defense, but the Senators are a team that runs toward the bottom of the salary cap and Phaneuf has a lot of years and money remaining.
Without the pressure of being on the #1 line and being captain, Phaneuf should be rejuvenated. He'll wear #2 for the Sens instead of #3 for the Leafs.
The Leafs get a tremendous salary dump and some talent back. The Senators are hoping Phaneuf can get them to the playoffs.
The Winnipeg Jets signed potential free agent Dustin Byfuglien to a 5-year contract. Easy to see the advantage in that deal.
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Traditionally, the CBC Super Bowl Sunday matinee was a national game since the Canadiens also had a national Super Bowl Saturday matinee. There was a certain charm to that weekend. So even though Bob Cole and Greg Millen called the Saturday matinee, a huge step up from last year's debacle where Rogers used local Edmonton announcers on Hockey Day in Canada, Rogers used the local crew for the Sunday matinee.
Yes, this would have been back-to-back games for Cole, but that would have been a nice touch, especially since the NHL Network did a live look-in on the 3rd period of the Sunday matinee.
Sportsnet One dropped the Edmonton game on Sunday, so Sportsnet West picked up the game. A bit surprised that Sportsnet Oilers didn't take over, allowing Alberta and Saskatchewan, the Northwest Territories, and Nunavut to see the Canadiens on Sportsnet West on Super Bowl Sunday. If those cable or satellite viewers had another regional Rogers Sportsnet channel, then they had options.
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I didn't capture the entire 3rd period of the NHL Network live look-in (my bad); in the final 8:21, I only caught a promo for the "X Company."
The CBC audience was taken to see the rest of the Winnipeg Jets game in the late timeslot. The NHL Network didn't go there.
My theory of possibly getting the Hockey Night in Canada games in the backup slot has been proven wrong. Last week and this week, the NHL Network went with U.S. games. Theoretically, they could have run a backup game that started an hour earlier, but chose games in the Central Time Zone as a backup.
The NHL Network could have offered up a matinee rebroadcast of any of the Hockey Day in Canada games, but offered no NHL matinee rebroadcasts on Sunday.
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Gord Miller will call the Sunday night game on NBCSN.
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NHL Network matinee feeds
Monday Carolina @ Montréal*; Edmonton @ NY Islanders*
Tuesday Tampa Bay @ Ottawa*
Thursday Ottawa @ Detroit*; Vancouver* @ Arizona
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