THE FLYERS HIVE Forums

eleven24 · #1 August 18th, 2005, 03:04 PM

Today the NHL announced that OLN, the home of Lance Armstrong & the Tour de France is now the home of the NHL.

ESPN declined to match the $200 million, 3-year offer made by Comcast, owner of OLN. The new deal will provide coverage of the NHL that, quite honestly, ESPN did not provide. A minimum of 58 regular season games will be aired on OLN, with the first game being the Flyers vs Rangers game on October 5th. These games will air every Monday and Tuesday night. OLN will also air complete coverage of the Stanley Cup playoffs.

Aside from the increased exposure, OLN and Comcast will also be providing more behind the scenes programming on the NHL. More games will be broadcast in HDTV. Perhaps most impressive, is that Comcast will be streaming complete games on the internet.

All in all, I think it's a great deal for the NHL. At ESPN the NHL was always a second rate sport. At OLN, the NHL will be the "golden child" of Comcast.

Future plans (maybe even this year) will include providing the feed of the NHL network to U.S. viewers.

Jlg-28 · #2 August 18th, 2005, 03:15 PM

I think this will be good for the NHL , seems like ESPN dosen't care much for hockey anyways , it will be interresting to see how well this works ,

I just hope that they don't black out Flyers games , maybe we will see other teams play when the flyers play at home ( since they already are on comcast sportsnet as it is ) or the road depending on who get flyers road games this year.

I can only imagine how good it could become.

Geddy_G · #3 August 18th, 2005, 05:24 PM

"More games will be broadcast in HDTV." Time for a new TV, and Digital Cable!!

Chris · #4 August 18th, 2005, 06:13 PM

Yeah, this makes me want a new TV. I've been wanting HD for a while. Should be interesting though, screw ESPN if they weren't interested.

Andy · #5 August 18th, 2005, 09:05 PM

We don't have OLN HD?

Rex · #6 August 18th, 2005, 10:16 PM

Yay, complete playoff coverage. Sexy!

eleven24 · #7 August 18th, 2005, 10:24 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Andy
We don't have OLN HD?

Nobody has OLN HD... yet. But if you're in the Philadelphia region & have Comcast, you're probably in luck. (Considering Comcast owns OLN & they're a Philadelphia based company)

Travis · #8 August 19th, 2005, 01:02 AM

The NHL Network in the States?!?! I think I like that more then anything.... (drool).

tmcc · #9 August 19th, 2005, 11:22 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Jlg947528

I just hope that they don't black out Flyers games , maybe we will see other teams play when the flyers play at home ( since they already are on comcast sportsnet as it is

I can only imagine how good it could become.

That's what I'm hoping. I doubt they'd black out home team games on Comcast. I agree, hopefully they'll run home games on CSN and others on OLN.

Drew · #10 August 19th, 2005, 02:27 PM

Win. I get OLN and Comcast Sportsnet with my basic cable package. That's mega-coverage of hockey.

Corduroy · #11 August 22nd, 2005, 10:58 AM

The downsize for this OLN-NHL agreement, is that people (us) from outside the States won't get any NHL coverage at all. At least, all major cable companies around here (Chile) just have regional ESPN, ESPN2 and FOX.

I wonder if DirectTV has it. But it costs four times my regular cable service.

I guess I'll have to rely on bittorrent sites to get some NHL action.

eleven24 · #12 August 22nd, 2005, 01:43 PM

DirecTV does have it (channel 608). I wouldn't worry though, now that OLN is a channel with some desire to it more cable companies will be adding it.

Also remember that OLN has plans on broadcasting live streaming video of NHL games, so you can watch over the net.