Thursday, August 18, 2011

NHL National TV Schedules Released, Predators Shunned Again

The NHL released its schedule of nationally televised games today and the Nashville Predators continued the tradition of receiving minimal coverage from the US national outlets. No games are currently scheduled for NBC, who will be in the first year of a new ten-year contract with the NHL.

Versus Network will televise two games involving the Predators, both on the road. The Preds' game in New York against the Rangers on Tuesday, January 17 at 6:30 p.m. (CT) is first up, while their contest in Chicago against the Blackhawks on Sunday, March 25th that is set for a 6:30 p.m. start is listed as a Versus/NBC flex game but only on the Versus schedule.

The Predators' home game against Calgary at 5 p.m. on New Year's Day is set to be on the NHL Network in the US but will be of little consequence to local fans as it will most likely be a rebroadcast of a feed from the Flames or Preds network and be blacked out locally.

The Predators fared better on Canadian TV with two home games on CBC's Hockey Night in Canada. The first against Montreal on November 12 at 6 p.m. and the second is against Winnipeg on March 24 at 6 p.m. I'm sure the draw for HNIC is the raucous Predator crowd as well as popular Canadian, Shea Weber.

TSN will have Nashville's game at Calgary on November 29th while TSN2 will also have the Preds at Rangers game on 1/17/12 and the Predators at Chicago on 3/25/12.

RDS will also have the Habs at Preds on November 12.

For the complete national schedules go here to the NHL.com release that has links to all schedules.

More Later...

Buddy Oakes for PredsOnTheGlass

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