Western NHL Fans No Longer Out In The Cold When It Comes To National TV Coverage
July 23, 2014 Leave a comment
LOS ANGELES — Oh what a difference eight years and six Stanley Cup Championships makes.
On July 22, the National Hockey League and NBC Sports released their 2014-15 national television schedule, one that features at least one Western Conference team in 56 games of its 103-game schedule. It also offers 35 “West-friendly” games, that is, games played on weekends or that begin at 6:00 PM Pacific time or later on weekdays.
The schedule released by the NHL and NBC Sports states that the 2014 Stanley Cup Champion Los Angeles Kings will be on NBC or NBCSN twelve times, but lists 13 games with the Kings as one of the combatants. But looking at the schedule on a broader scale, the 2014-15 national television schedule is a huge improvement for the league compared just a handful of years ago when the West was treated as a forgotten stepchild.
