The NHL Looks to Capitalize Off 4 Nations Buzz as it Returns to Play

After attracting eyeballs from all over North America, the NHL looks to capitalize off that momentum as it returns to play.

FORT LAUDERDALE — The NHL is riding high off of the buzz generated by the 4 Nations Face-Off.

Thursday’s finale between the United States and Canada was the second-most watched hockey game in North America in the past decade, trailing just last June’s Stanley Cup Final Game 7 between the Florida Panthers and the Edmonton Oilers with 16.1 million total viewers across the continent, per NHL Public Relations.

Florida lifted the Stanley Cup for the first time in its franchise history in front of 16.3 million people in June.

But there has been something special created by the tournament that the league needs to capitalize on.

Fans from all over the United States tuned into hockey games for the first time — or at least gave them a long, hard watch for the first time — and fell in love with the sport. Now, the NHL returns to action on Saturday with a chance to retain their attention.

“There was definitely some juice watching it,” Panthers defenseman Aaron Ekblad said. “It was fun, especially those Canada-U.S. games. I think those were the ones that people tuned into and then I obviously loved the Sweden-Finland game just to see our guys go at it. It was a good tournament, a lot of fun. It’s great for the league.”

The national television slate on Saturday night consists of an afternoon clash between the Minnesota Wild and Detroit Red Wings — a timely one considering Dylan Larkin’s standout performance for Team USA — and a 3 p.m. clash between Sidney Crosby’s Pittsburgh Penguins and Alexander Ovechkin’s Washington Capitals, both being on ABC.

The latter of those two games presents a unique chance for the league to capitalize on all of the new fans whose eyeballs they attracted from the tournament.

On one hand, Crosby is playing in that game days after leading Team Canada to a championship in front of all of those people as its captain. And he showed that he can flat-out dominate games, still, at the age of 37.

On the other hand, Alexander Ovechkin returns from a two-week break 16 goals away from breaking Wayne Gretzky’s NHL goals record. A good portion of Washington’s games are on national television going forward for that reason, and the league has a chance to introduce fans to the Presidents’ Trophy front-runners who did not send a single player to the Four Nations tournament.

Oh yeah, there’s also the longstanding rivarly between the two generational talents to jump off from too.

The Panthers and Oilers will clash in a Stanley Cup Final rematch on Thursday — exactly one week after Edmonton superstar Connor McDavid scored the overtime-winning goal for Canada — but it will only be available to out-of-market viewers on ESPN+ in the United States.

From a league-wide perspective, the players know how much buzz this tournament generated and they are hungry to capitalize off of it.

The Panthers know that better than anybody after sending eight players — the most in the league — to the 4 Nations Face-Off.

“We’ll watch for that, right?” Florida coach Paul Maurice said.

“It’s an interesting thing. I heard listening to the broadcast that Washington might be the only team that didn’t have a guy, and they’re sitting in first place. But we have the biggest number, and I think all of them, with the exception of Matthew Tkachuk [who is injured,] will come back feeling really good about where they’re at with their performance and being able to apply that to their game.We think we’ll get a bounce from these guys.”