from Shlomo Sprung of Sports Money,

When the National Hockey League suspended play on March 12 due to the coronavirus pandemic, its 31 teams were suddenly confronted with no games, no open arenas, no concession or parking revenue and no obvious, direct way to keep their tens of millions of fans interested and engaged as the world faced months of quarantine and isolation.

“How are we putting ourselves in a position that we can continue to provide a source of entertainment, a source of hope and help people heal throughout this process,” asked Jake Reynolds, the New Jersey Devils’ team president.

For a large number of teams, the answer was esports titles like EA Sports’ NHL 20. And with the NHL game day experience abruptly a thing of the past, clubs like the Devils wanted to provide as best an approximation of that game day feeling as it could. So New Jersey quickly mobilized its content and marketing staff to bring its fans NHL 20 simulations on every game night against its would-be opponents for the remainder of the 2019-2020 season.

New Jersey got Matt Loughlin, its radio announcer, to do the play-by-play for the games. The team integrated actual game day sponsors like M&Ms for its moment of the game, PSE&G for its power plays, Investors Bank for a team roll call and RWJBarnabas Health for the starting goalie matchup.

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