Kukla's Korner Hockey

Kukla's Korner Hockey

The Influence Of HNIC On Rogers/Sportsnet

09/30/2014 at 6:58pm EDT

from Scott Stinson of the National Post,

This is the curious thing about “the new home of hockey,” as Scott Moore, president of Sportsnet and NHL Properties, described it: It’s a lot like the old home. The CBC’s influence is everywhere, including a production staff of about 20 that will work on Rogers-produced hockey broadcasts. There are even red armchairs for Strombo. All of this familiarity is by design. And it speaks to a broadcaster in Rogers that spent an extraordinary amount of money on NHL rights — the $4.5-million invested in the new studio is 0.086% of what it paid to lock up Canadian broadcasts for a dozen years — and is very aware that its audience might not care for a great deal of change.

“We’re not going to do a glowing puck,” as Moore told me in an interview, standing on a studio floor that can light up like a video wall, allowing analysts to demonstrate tactics on the virtual ice. Some degree of continuity for Hockey Night viewers, he says, was always part of the plan.

“I’d like to think we’ve kept that in the back of our heads from day one,” Moore says. “From the first discussions with the NHL, we talked about how could we keep the Saturday night tradition? How could we keep the CBC involved?”

“I think you’ll see us advance storytelling, advance the technology, but not wipe the board clean of what’s been done in the past.”

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Paul Kukla founded Kukla’s Korner in 2005 and the site has since become the must-read site on the ‘net for all the latest happenings around the NHL.

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