Sid provided the list with an excerpt from a Boston paper which I'd like to
comment on.
 
>deserved better and the NC$$ knows it. "We're thinking about the hockey
>situation" Phil Buttafuoco of the NC$$ said from Kansas City yesterday.
>(yeah sure...about wether or not to push hockey back to 3 am tape delay --Sid)
>"We have some options." One would be to escape the ESPN contract with four
>years to run and put the title game on Prime Network live or on tape at the
>discretion of the outlet(which is NESN in New England). ESPN began to televise
>the hockey championship on Saturday nights in 1985 to avoid the basketball
>Final Four which was then on CBS in the afternoon and early evening. When
 
Is the NC$$ brain dead (kind of a rhetorical question.)  Why are they trying to
emulate the brilliant strategy of the NHL, which took its TV from a primary
national cable outlet (ESPN) to a secondary/regional network (Sportschannel)?
The NHL succeeded in destroying a good piece of its national audience--and they
wondered why no one in the Sun Belt cared about their product? ;-)The problem
is not the broadcaster, it's their schedule.  Mike M's suggestion of a Friday
night/Sunday afternoon tournament avoids going head to head with the men's
basketball Final Four.  I would doubt that PRIME has significant national
cable penetration.  In fact I could easily see our local cable outlet, Troy
Newchannels, not even picking up the feed thus depriving one of the
better :-C  college hockey markets of the Big Game.  Why don't they put the
women on Saturday night against the men...a kind of network battle of the
sexes? :-J
 
>basketball shifted in 1988 to the current schedule ESPN put the Wisconsin
>-Colgate title game on seven-day delay. (YEECCHHH! --Sid)
 
I agree Sid.  What a terrible time for Dave Gagnon to have an off-night!
 
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