Canes relegated to only one national TV game next season -- again
The Carolina Hurricanes’ Stanley Cup playoff run to the Eastern Conference finals earned it a lot of national TV time on NBC -- last season.
The Canes’ playoff success didn’t translate to more TV time in the coming 2019-20 regular season.
The Canes again will be shown on the NBC Sports Group just once, on March 5, in the road game against the Philadelphia Flyers. That’s it -- one and done.
NBC released its national hockey schedule Tuesday, trumpeting the 109 games that will be shown this season, including 14 doubleheaders on its “Wednesday Night Hockey showcase.” The NBC release said “Established stars and young phenoms will take center stage on ‘Wednesday Night Hockey’” but that won’t include the Canes’ Sebastian Aho or Andrei Svechnikov.
In May, NBC announced the rating for Game 1 of the Canes’ Eastern Conference finals series against the Boston Bruins was the highest in NBCSN history for Game 1 of the conference finals.
The Canes have gotten short shrift from NBC in recent seasons. They were televised once in the 2018-19 season and once in 2017-18 -- on April 5, 2018, in their 81st game of the regular season.
This story was originally published August 6, 2019 at 11:08 AM.
