NHL Hits Ratings Bonanza For Five Game 7s Over The Weekend

Despite not having a network broadcast, the NHL has seen a rise in their national ratings thanks to the partnership with ESPN and Turner. Regardless of what you think of the broadcasters, studio analysts and other things, hockey fans are tuning in more this year than they did last year to watch the Stanley Cup Playoffs.

Granted NBC mailed it in last year because they knew they were losing the NHL, still having hockey on a bigger stage with ESPN and Turner has sent playoff ratings through the roof. Helping that cause was the fact the NHL had five Game 7s to close out the first round of the playoffs this past weekend.

Let’s take a look at how the NHL ratings did this past weekend.

Game 7s Power NHL TV Ratings

The following numbers are from Showbuzzdaily.com

Saturday NHL Ratings:

Toronto Maple Leafs vs Tampa Bay Lightning at 7:08 pm on Turner averaged 1.683 million viewers with a .58 in the P18-49 demo.

Carolina Hurricanes vs Boston Bruins at 4:29 pm on ESPN averaged 1.629 million viewers with.52 in the P18-49 demo.

The late featured the Edmonton Oilers vs Los Angeles Kings at 10:00 pm averaged 1.064 million viewers with .39 in the P18-49 demo.

All three Stanley Cup Playoff Game 7s were one, two, and three on the cable charts. And while their viewership numbers did not beat network television, just looking at the demo, the NHL was one, two, and three in the P18-49 for network and cable television on Saturday.

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Sunday NHL Ratings:

There were two more Game 7s on Sunday let’s see how they fared on the charts.

New York Rangers vs Pittsburgh Penguins at 7:05 pm averaged 2.325 million viewers with .80 in the P18-49 demo. The game was broadcast on Turner and was ranked third on cable behind the NBA. This was the highest-rated game of the 2022 Stanley Cup Playoffs and the most-watched Game 7 since 1994. The Rangers and Penguins series was the most-watched series this year averaging over a million viewers.

This series has been the biggest draw of the postseason accounting for six of the 10 largest audiences with six of the seven games exceeding one million viewers.

The Calgary Flames vs Dallas Stars at 9:30 pm averaged 1.015 million viewers with .37 in the P18-49 demo. This game ranked sixth on the cable charts for Sunday. This was the best rating for this series.

ESPN and Turner are Good For NHL Ratings

The NHL has seen a rating increase of over 60 percent this postseason with ESPN and Turner being good for the NHL. Thus far the biggest draw in these playoffs has been the Rangers and Penguins series. The second biggest draw was Game 7 of the Lightning-Maple Leafs followed by the Hurricanes-Bruins series. The Hurricanes-Bruins series had two games average over the million mark.

The Penguins-Rangers and Hurricanes-Bruins series account for 11 of the 12 most-watched games thus far.

With the Rangers continuing into round 2 look for their numbers to average above the million viewer mark.