NHL on ABC

After being dropped by NBC after the 1974–75 season,[1][2][3] the NHL did not maintain a national television contract in the United States.[4][5][6] In response to this, the league put together a network of independent stations covering approximately 55% of the country.[7][8][9]

Games typically aired on Monday nights[10] (beginning at 8 p.m. Eastern Time) or Saturday afternoons. The package was offered to local stations without a rights fee.[11] Profits would instead be derived from the advertising, which was about evenly split between the network and the local station. The Monday night games were often billed as "The NHL Game of the Week".[12]

Initially, the Monday night package was marketed to ABC affiliates; the idea being that ABC carried NFL football games on Monday nights in the fall and (starting in May 1976) Major League Baseball games on Monday nights in the spring and summer, stations would want the hockey telecasts to create a year-round Monday night sports block; however, very few ABC stations chose to pick up the package.

In 1979, ABC was contracted to televise Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Finals.[13][14] Since the Finals ended in five games, the contract was void.[15]

It was also around this time that ABC offered the NHL a limited deal that NHL president John Ziegler Jr.[16] quickly rejected. ABC wanted to split the network and show the NHL in the Northeast and Midwest and NASCAR in the South on Sunday afternoons.

Even though ABC didn't yet televise National Hockey League games, they were the American network broadcast home of the Winter Olympic games beginning in 1964 and continuing through the 1988 Winter Games from Calgary. For the ice hockey events, employed Curt Gowdy for play-by-play duties in 1968 and 1976 (NBC had the broadcasting rights for the 1972 Games in the interim) Games. Gowdy worked with Brian Conacher for the 1976 ice hockey events.

For years later at Lake Placid, ABC was on hand for a medal-round men's ice hockey game that would soon become known the "Miracle on Ice". On February 22, 1980, the United States team, made up of amateur and collegiate players and led by coach Herb Brooks, defeated the Soviet team, which consisted of veteran professional players with significant experience in international play. The rest of the United States (except those who watched the game live on Canadian television) had to wait to see the game, as ABC decided to broadcast the late-afternoon game on tape delay in prime time.[17] Sportscaster Al Michaels, who was calling the game on ABC along with former Montreal Canadiens goalie Ken Dryden, picked up on the countdown in his broadcast, and delivered his famous call:[18]

Eleven seconds, you've got ten seconds, the countdown going on right now! Morrow, up to Silk. Five seconds left in the game. Do you believe in miracles? YES!

Al Michaels would continue serving as ABC's top play-by-play announcer for their ice hockey coverage for their next two Winter Olympics. In 1984 from Sarajevo, Michaels again worked alongside Ken Dryden while Mike Eruzione, who was the captain of the gold medal winning United States ice hockey team from 1980, primarily worked with Don Chevrier. For ABC's final Winter Olympics four years later, Michaels was once again, working with Dryden while Eruzione was this time, paired with Jiggs McDonald.

In 1989,[19] the NHL signed a two-year contract (lasting through the 1990–91 season) with ABC Radio for the broadcast rights to the All-Star Game and Stanley Cup Finals.[20][21] ABC Radio named Don Chevrier and Phil Esposito as their main commentating crew.[22][23][24][25]

In the 1992–93 season, ABC televised five weekly playoff telecasts (the first 3 weeks were regional coverage of various games and 2 national games)[26][27] on Sunday afternoons starting on April 18. This marked the first time that playoff National Hockey League games were broadcast on American network television[28] since 1974–75 (when NBC was the NHL's American broadcast television partner[29][30][31][32][33][34][35]). In the 1993–94 season, ABC televised six[36] weekly regional telecasts[37][38] on Sunday afternoons beginning in March[39] (or the last three Sundays[40] of the regular season). This marked the first time that regular season National Hockey League games were broadcast on American network television[41] since 1974–75 (when NBC was the NHL's American broadcast television partner). ABC then televised three weeks worth of playoff games on first three Sundays[42] – the final game was Game 1 between the Boston Bruins and the New Jersey Devils, a game that was aired nationally. The network did not televise the Stanley Cup Finals, which instead, were televised nationally by ESPN and by Prime Ticket in Los Angeles (1993) and MSG Network in New York (1994). Games televised on ABC were not subject to blackout.

These broadcasts (just as was the case with the 1999–2004 package) were essentially, time-buys[43] by ESPN.[44][45] In other words, ABC would sell three-hour blocks of airtime to ESPN,[46] which in return, would produce, supply broadcasters and sell advertising. Also as evidence by ABC's Raycom[47] produced college basketball package around the same time period, this arrangement could also be interpreted as a way to avoid union contracts, which require that 100% of network shows had to use crew staff who were network union members.[48] The main difference is that the graphics used for the telecasts were those used by ABC Sports, instead of the ones seen on ESPN National Hockey Night. In later years, the roles would be reversed as ESPN's graphical style would be used on the broadcasts with the exception of intermission reports. ABC even used ESPN's theme music[49] (composed by Bob Christianson) for the 1992–1994 coverage. During ABC's next stint with the NHL, the network used its own theme music.[50]

Overall, ABC averaged a 1.7 rating[51][52][53] for those two seasons. John Saunders was the studio pregame/intermission anchor just like he would be for the 1999-2004 NHL package on ABC.

When the NHL television contract went up for negotiation in early 1994, Fox (which was in the process of launching its sports division after acquiring the rights to the National Football Conference of the NFL) and CBS (which was hoping to land a major sports contract to replace the NFL rights that they lost to Fox and Major League Baseball rights that they lost to ABC and NBC) competed heavily for the package. On September 9, 1994, the National Hockey League reached a five-year, US$155 million contract with Fox for the broadcast television rights to the league's games, beginning with the 1994–95 season,[54] effectively ending ABC's time-buy deal with ESPN after just two seasons.

• John Saunders

1. Gary Thorne
2. Tom Mees
3. Mike Emrick
4. Al Michaels
5. Bob Miller (1993–94)
6. Sam Rosen (1993–94)

1. Bill Clement
2. John Davidson
3. Darren Pang (1993–94)
4. Joe Micheletti (1993–94)
5. Jim Schoenfeld (1993)

1. Al Morganti
2. Bob Neumeier
3. Brenda Brenon[55]
4. Mark Jones

April 17,[66][67] 24, May 1: Playoffs

In August 1998, ABC, ESPN, and ESPN2 signed a five-year television deal with the NHL, worth a total of approximately US$600 million[76][77] (or $120 million per year), beginning with the league's 1999–2000 season. The $120 million per year that ABC and ESPN paid for rights dwarfed the $5.5 million that the NHL received from American national broadcasts in the 1991–92 season.[78] As previously mentioned, as was the case with the 1992–1994 deal, ABC's subsequent NHL coverage was in reality, made up of time–buys from ESPN. This was noted in copyright beds at the conclusion of the telecasts, i.e. "The preceding program has been paid for by ESPN, Inc." ESPN then signed a similar television rights contract in 2002 so it could produce and broadcast National Basketball Association games on ABC.

In May 2004, NBC and ESPN reached an agreement to broadcast NHL games beginning in the 2004–05 season, which would end up being canceled as a result of the 2004–05 NHL lockout; ESPN would later withdraw from the deal in favor of OLN, which wound up being rebranded as NBCSN in 2012. In the interval between the 2004 Stanley Cup Finals and the start of the 2005–06 season, several ABC affiliates, including WDTN in Dayton, Ohio (a secondary market for the Columbus Blue Jackets) and WAND in Springfield, Illinois (which is served by the Chicago Blackhawks and the St. Louis Blues), affiliated with NBC.

This time around, ABC televised four to five weeks worth of regional games on Saturday afternoons beginning in January.

1. John Saunders
2. John Davidson (studio analyst from 1999–2002)
3. Barry Melrose (studio analyst from 2002–04)

1. Al Michaels (2000–2002)
2. Chris Berman (2003–2004)

1. Gary Thorne
2. Steve Levy
3. Mike Emrick
4. Dave Strader (1999–2002)

1. Bill Clement and John Davidson (2003–2004)
2. Darren Pang
3. Barry Melrose (1999–2002)
4. Brian Engblom (2002–04)
5. Jim Schoenfeld (1999–2002)

[79]

[80]

Besides the National Hockey League All-Star Game,[90] ABC televised Games 3–7 of the Stanley Cup Finals[91] in prime time. In the league's previous broadcast television deal with Fox, the network split coverage of the Stanley Cup Finals with ESPN. Games 1, 5 and 7 were usually scheduled to be televised by Fox; Games 2, 3, 4 and 6 by ESPN. However, from 1995 to 1998, the Finals were all four-game sweeps; 1999 ended in six games. The consequence was that – except for 1995, when Fox did televise Game 4 – the decisive game was never on network television.

2003 was the only year that ABC broadcast both the NBA and the Stanley Cup Finals that involved teams from one city in the same year, as both the New Jersey Nets and the New Jersey Devils were in their respective league's finals. During ABC's broadcast of Game 3 between the San Antonio Spurs and the Nets in New Jersey on June 8, Brad Nessler, Tom Tolbert and Bill Walton said that ABC was in a unique situation getting ready for both that game and Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Finals between the Devils and the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim the following night, also at Continental Airlines Arena. Gary Thorne, Bill Clement and John Davidson mentioned this the following night, and thanked Nessler, Tolbert and Walton for promoting ABC's broadcast of Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Finals.[92]

Following the 2003–04 season, ESPN was only willing to renew its contract for two additional years at $60 million per year.[93] ABC refused to televise the Stanley Cup Finals in prime time, suggesting that the Finals games it would telecast be played on weekend afternoons (including a potential Game 7). Disney executives later conceded that they overpaid for the 1999–2004 deal, so the company's offer to renew the television rights was lower in 2004.[94]