By George Eichorn of the Detroit Monitor 

It‘s hockey time again in the United States and Canada as the Detroit Red Wings and the other 29 National Hockey League (NHL) teams dominate the airwaves and television sets across North America. Our annual Monitor look at the league’s broadcast details center around the Wings and other U.S. and Canada partners.

- LOCAL TV: Fox Sports Net Detroit (FSN) continues its exclusive production of Red Wings games by televising 74 regular-season contests with 65 games scheduled or airing on FSN and nine on FSN Plus. FSN earlier carried three pre-season games and they will televise all non-exclusive games in the first two rounds of the Stanley Cup playoffs, should the Red Wings qualify.

“FSN continues to lead the NHL in technological advances by airing a substantial number of Red Wings games in high-definition on FSN HD (HD schedule to be announced at a later date),” according to spokesman Tim Bryant.

The popular duo of Ken Daniels and Mickey Redmond returned as the Wings TV announce crew with former Wing Larry Murphy filling in for Redmond during select road games. John Keating serves as host of the “Red Wings Live” pre-game shows which air 30 minutes prior to most game. Mickey York, FSN’s primary anchorman will be at many “Red Wings Live” post-game telecasts with live reaction, analysis and game highlights. FSN Detroit has earned 45 Michigan Emmys since 2000, including honors this past season for Station Excellence and their promotion of the HD coverage of the Wings.

Channel 4 will feature select Red Wings pre-game and post-game shows anchored by Bernie Smilovitz with Redmond and Katrina Hancock, when the club is on NBC later this season.

- LOCAL RADIO: All 82 regular-season and all post-season games will be carried live by 97.1 FM, “The Ticket” with award-winning Ken Kal and Paul Woods providing the call. Kal received recognition of his Stanley Cup-calling season one year ago by winning the prestigious Ty Tyson Award for Excellence in Sports Broadcasting this summer from the Detroit Sports Broadcasters Association.

- NATIONAL TV: Three season highlights: The NHL season on Versus-TV opened in Europe October 4-5 as the New York Rangers and Tampa Bay Lightning traveled to Prague, Czech Republic, and the Pittsburgh Penguins and Ottawa Senators played two games against each other in Stockholm, Sweden. It is the second consecutive year the NHL opened regular-season play in Europe.

On January 1, 2009, NBC in the U.S. and CBC and RDS in Canada will televise NHL Winter Classic 2009, featuring the Wings and Chicago Black Hawks playing at historic Wrigley Field, home of the Chicago Cubs. The matinee game will be the second regular-season outdoor NHL game played in the U.S. and the third regular-season outdoor game in league history.

The 57th NHL All-Star Game will be played January 25 in Montreal, which will host the 2009 game as part of the celebration of the club’s 100th anniversary. The game, as well as All-Star Saturday on Jan. 24, will be seen live on Versus in the U.S. and CBC and RDS in Canada.

Versus and NBC return for a fourth season as the NHL’s national television partners. Versus opened its fourth year of NHL coverage with a doubleheader on October 5. Versus’ schedule includes seven appearances by the Wings which began with the opener last week. In all, Versus will televise 56 regular-season games, All-Star weekend, games in each round of the Stanley Cup playoffs and the first two games of the Stanley Cup Finals. Every game on Versus is produced and shown in HD where available.

Versus announcers include Mike “Doc” Emrick, analyst Eddie Olczyk, Dave Strader and reporter Bob Harwood. Studio hosts include Bill Patrick, Brian Engblom and Keith Jones.

After NBC (WDIV-TV locally) launches its NHL coverage New Year’s Day, the NHL “Game of the Week” starts January 18 when the Penguins host the Rangers. Face-off is 12:30 p.m. for all NBC games except April 12 at 2 p.m. Up to five Wings games could end up on NBC and channel 4. Emrick and Olczyk head the telecasts.

The NHL and NBC will again collaborate on flexible scheduling for NBC’s regular-season dates, providing fans the most exciting match-up available. NBC will select from up to four games on Sunday afternoons. Thirteen days prior to the scheduled game, a game will be selected for broadcast on NBC. The network also has postseason telecasts including Games 3-7 of the Stanley Cup Finals.

In Canada, CBC (channel 9) began its 56th consecutive year of NHL coverage October 4 on “Hockey Night in Canada.” The 69-game schedule for the season is headlined by 25 all-Canadian match-ups. CBC’s “Hockey Day in Canada” will celebrate its ninth annual broadcast on February 21 from Campbellton, New Brunswick. Three Red Wings games are slated for CBC including the New Year’s Day game at Wrigley Field.

CBC play-by-play is delivered by Bob Cole, Jim Hughson and Mark Lee. Analysts are Cassie Campbell, Don Cherry, Harry Neale, Marc Crawford, Garry Galley, Kelly Hrudey, Greg Millen, Mike Milbury, Scott Morison, Craig Simpson and P.J. Stock. Hosts include Ron MacLean, Steve Armitage, Elliotte Friedman, Scott Oake and Bruce Rainnie. CBC’s pregame show is “Hockey Tonight” and its post-game show, “After Hours.”

Canada’s TSN began covering the NHL in 1985 and is once again the national English-language cable partner. TSN begins its new six-year broadcast and digital rights agreement with the NHL featuring more coverage of Canadian teams than ever before. The network will televise 70 regular-season games and, for the first time, all games will feature at least one of the NHL’s Canadian teams and will be available nationally in HD. Five Wings games are featured on TSN while three are slated on TSN2.

TSN/TSN2 broadcasters include host James Duthrie, play-by-play men Gord Miller and Chris Cuthbert, analyst Pierre Maguire and studio analysts Bob McKenzie, Darren Dreger and Dave Hodge.

RDS, the French-language telecast partner of the NHL, enters its sixth year of NHL coverage. This season, RDS will televise all 82 Montreal games and 29 other NHL games, including 5 Red Wings contests. Sister network RIS will carry 45 NHL games with four featuring Detroit.

RDS and RIS announcers include host Alain Crete, studio analysts Jacques Demers, play-by-play voice Pierre House, analyst Benoit Brunet and reporter Chantal Machabee.

NHL Network began its fourth season of televising live regular season games in Canada and its second season showing live games in the U.S. NHL Network this season will televise 75 live games for its American audience and 40 live NHL games for its Canadian viewers. All games shown in the U.S. will be in HD. In addition, the network’s signature show, “NHL On The Fly,” returns nightly providing highlights and analysis of every game.

Highlighting the schedule is the inclusion of CBC’s award-winning Hockey Night In Canada, available to U.S. fans for the first time. Every Saturday night, NHL Network will not only broadcast the live Hockey Night In Canada double-header, but also the CBC pre-game and post-game shows.

Regular-season coverage on NHL Network also includes 26 double-headers and one triple-header, 17 Wednesday-night games featuring TSN’s broadcast of Wednesday Night Hockey and five games featuring the Wings.

ESPN will feature NHL coverage on SportsCenter, ESPNews and ESPN.com as well as other network platforms. Matthew Barnaby, a 15-year NHL veteran player, has signed on as a hockey analyst, replacing Barry Melrose who now coaches the NHL Lightning.

NATIONAL RADIO: Westwood One Radio returns its “This Week in the NHL” radio show with host Sam Rosen and co-hosts Mike Emrick, Bob McKenzie, Jim Fox, Steve Coates and Joe Tolleson. Game action includes a weekly selection, the Winter Classic, All-Star Game and the Stanley Cup Finals.

Reach George Eichorn at geichorn@yahoo.com.

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