NHL commissioner wants to ‘tweak’ Olympic hockey experience

If the outcome of men’s hockey tournament at the 2026 Winter Olympics didn’t convince NHL commissioner Gary Bettman that his league’s participation was a net positive, the weeks since might have.

Jon Lewis of Sports Media Watch reported Friday that NHL ratings on national broadcasts are up 23% from pre-Olympic levels. The first eight games on ABC, ESPN and TNT averaged 603,000 viewers, Lewis reported.

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The NHL saw a similar (but smaller) increase in viewership after the Four Nations Face-Off a year ago. Still, even in a tournament that saw the United States defeat Canada in overtime to claim the gold medal, not everything went perfectly to script for Bettman.

Team Canada captain Sidney Crosby was injured and couldn’t play in the final or semifinal games. Swiss defenseman Kevin Fiala suffered an injury that ended his season with the Los Angeles Kings.

The start time of the championship game — before the sun rose in much of the United States on a Sunday — was also less than ideal. Bettman said the television ratings for the game “would’ve been twice as high” if it started in the afternoon instead.

It’s unclear how Bettman could lessen his players’ risk of injury the next time they participate in the Winter Olympics. (The 2030 edition of the Games will be held in France.) But there will be a next time, Bettman said in a new interview with Puck’s John Ourand on The Varsity podcast — possibly with some tweaks.

“There are things we can tweak the would make this a better experience both for the Olympics and for the NHL and our players,” he told Ourand. “So we have some work to do. But the intention is to continue to go every two years, best on best, whether it’s ours (the Four Nations Face-Off) and the Players’ Association or it’s the Olympics.”

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