Seventh heaven for Stanley Cup on CBC and NBC

There's nothing like a seventh game to get hearts a-beating, the rhetoric flowing and ratings rising. Friday's seventh game of the Stanley Cup final, which went down to the wire, didn't disappoint anyone on either side of the border.

An average audience of 3.529 million watched on CBC, the highest ever for an all-American final. But not even that big number, almost 800,000 more than the number who watched the deciding Game 6 last year, could save CBC from a decrease.

Overall, the final averaged 2.154 million, down 7 per cent from last year.

On NBC, things couldn't have worked out any better. Friday's game was the most-watched NHL game in 36 years, which gives you an indication of which way hockey has been heading in the U.S.

It averaged 8 million viewers, 1.4 million fewer than the 9.4 million who watched a Montreal-Chicago Game 6 in 1973.

Overall, the series averaged 5.6 million viewers on NBC, the best since 2002.

So what can we take from all these mind-numbing numbers? For one, CBC couldn't attract as many viewers as it did for the same two teams last season. As for reasons, your guess is as good as mine or CBC's. There are some who believe many Canadians are opting to watch on NBC, which is a possibility, though there's absolutely no evidence to back that up.

Maybe Canadians just got tired of watching the same two teams. Or maybe they got tired of the way CBC turned every game into the Don Cherry Show.

Game seven and how does CBC start things? With some bizarre opening featuring Wagner's "Ride of the Valkyries," players' names in Gothic script and the Collar That Walks Like A Man, bedecked in some strange biker outfit, plucking a dead octopus out of the river. What this all meant is anyone's guess.

More amazingly, the CBC showed it again during Coach's Corner.

As for the American experience, it's all good news. Increased ratings and big numbers certainly can't hurt. Who knows, it may even get the NHL a rights fee some day.

Here are the top English-language weekend sports ratings, according to BBM Nielsen Media Research overnight figures:

1. Hockey, Penguins at Red Wings, Friday, CBC: 3,529,000*
2. Hockey, Hockey Night In Canada pre-game, Friday, CBC: 745,000
3. Auto racing, NASCAR Lifelock 400, Saturday, TSN: 294,0004.Baseball, Marlins at Blue Jays, Saturday, TSN: 294,000
5. Baseball, Marlins at Blue Jays, Friday, TSN: 273,000
6. Baseball, Marlins at Blue Jays, Sunday, Sportsnet: 186,000
7. Basketball, Lakers at Magic, Sunday, TSN: 183,000*
8. Equestrian, Spruce Meadows Grand Prix, Saturday, CBC: 71,000
9. Soccer, Confederations Cup, Sunday, CBC: 61,000
* Viewers on U.S. channels not calculated

Comments

[Andrew]

I grew up watching HNIC, but I can safely say that I would rather watch NBC--or especially TSN--for hockey now. Apart from Kelly Hrudey and Elliotte Friedman, HNIC's commentators have nothing useful to add. And the intro to every single game of the final this year made me cringe.

[David Hutchison]

For what it's worth, here's one Canadian who prefers the NBC coverage to the Donald.

[frank godfrey]

Andrew, I have to agree - HNIC is bush. Isn't it incredibly lucky for the NHL and the network that the Wings didn't win this thing 4 straight, which wouldn't have surprised too many the way the series started. Crosby wouldn't even had time to grow that thing over his lip.

[krister]

"Maybe Canadians just got tired of watching the same two teams. Or maybe they got tired of the way CBC turned every game into the Don Cherry Show"

Count me as one who switched to NBC because of the above. The other reason was that the play-by-play guy on NBC actually sounded passionate about the game.

[Stephen]

Agreed that CBC's coverage was pretty awful this year, although at least without Bob Cole's constant gaffes the commentary was just dull rather than embarrassingly bad.

That said, a big difference is that the NBC HD feed is noticeably better than the CBC equivalent. Flipping back and forth between the two last Friday, the CBC feed looked like it had been filtered through a screen door, and had noticeably worse sound quality. That, combined with Mike Emrick's solid play by play work had everyone watching it at my place voting for NBC.

If CBC wants to retain viewers, they need to recognise that they have to at least match the audiovisual quality of the NBC feed, because their on-air talent is only slightly better at best. The only time CBC was better was in the postgame - and even then, there was the gaffe with missing Malkin being awarded the Conn Smythe.

[Hairy Larry]

Where's all the soccer fans now? After all, they were trying to tell anyone who'd listen that soccer was becoming as big as hockey in Canada. But I mean 3.6 million viewrs to 61,000? I think you better worry about becoming more popular then equestrian and basketball before you even think about hockey.

[Mike]

who ever said soccer was as big as hockey in Canada? And if you were going to do a comparison, it wouldn't be the Confedations Cup (never heard of it) vs. game 7 of the Stanley Cup finals.

[Josh O'Donnell]

I also watched NBC over CBC. Cherry is just getting way too annoying to me, and PJ Stock isn't much better. Between that and having McGuire between the benches, which is the best feature that has been added to hockey broadcasts in a while, I just prefer NBC.

And to Hairy Larry, Sunday's soccer game was a meaningless game in a competition that not even many soccer fans care about between the #1 team in the world and a team ranked outside of the top 70. Just wait until there is actually a big soccer game on TV (Brazil vs. Italy on Sunday for example, or even better the World Cup Final next year) before you bash soccer. Obviously we all know soccer isn't as popular as hockey, but thats not even a fair comparison, the only thing that game #7 of the Finals can be compared to is the World Cup Final. It would be like me saying that only 1 million people watch Leafs games on CBC, while 3 million watched the finals, so there must be more Red Wings and Penguins fans in Canada, than Leafs fans.

[Peter Brown]

"There are some who believe many Canadians are opting to watch on NBC, which is a possibility, though there's absolutely no evidence to back that up."

There is also absolutely no evidence to suggest that 99 percent of Canadians watch the Stanley Cup Finals on HNIC, as some believe. Until our bush-league ratings system counts Canadians viewing U.S. channels, then we can only speculate.

Given that cable and satellite service has a market penetration of at least 87 percent (that was the 2005 figure in a Nielsen survey: http://www.crtc.gc.ca/ENG/publications/reports/radio/cmri.htm), and that most of the other 13 percent probably live in urban areas that can receive U.S. over-the-air broadcasts, the fact that Nielsen still does not measure Canadian audiences of U.S. channels is, frankly, ridiculous.

[JP]

I've seen Boston stations pop up from time to time in the seasonal BBM ratings for the Maritimes. Why are they included in some reports but not in others?