The 2024-25 NHL season proved to be unlike anything before from a ratings perspective. From the NHL-run 4 Nations Face-Off tournament’s incredible success, to Washington Capitals’ star Alexander Ovechkin’s chase for the league’s all-time goal-scoring record, the league had its fair share of high highs. However, there were massive lows too, including a dreadful Stanley Cup Final and an all-time low for the Winter Classic.
Tuesday’s Cup Final Game 6, which saw the Florida Panthers pull off a series victory against the Edmonton Oilers for the second straight year, averaged 2.8 million viewers across TNT and truTV. That was down 33% from Game 6 last year (which aired on broadcast TV on ABC), and was the lowest Game 6 number since Vancouver Canucks-New York Rangers in 1994. It added to a lackluster ratings series for TNT, which looks worse year-over-year in total due to last year’s series going seven games, but still saw significant game-by-game declines.
Of course, the TNT numbers come with a heavy cable versus broadcast caveat, especially in the 2025 cord-cutting environment. This year’s series only dropped 4% from TNT’s last Cup Final broadcast in 2023. And while it was the least-watched overall series in the U.S. since Ottawa Senators-Anaheim Ducks in 2007, which featured two games on Versus, which was then worse-distributed than TNT now, but went to NBC for the three concluding games, a lot of that’s likely about it being on cable.
Beyond that, there’s also the Canadian team/one local market factor. That’s always a hit on U.S. ratings. But, as NHL commissioner Gary Bettman repeatedly noted during this series, that plays just fine in Canada, with this rematch even seeing year-over-year ratings boosts early on. And the league is actually getting more broadcast money from Canada’s Rogers and will continue to do so. So while a Canadian team in the Final hurts the U.S. ratings, it’s probably fine for the league overall, just as it was last year.
The more notable Final argument could be that if any series suggests that national U.S. hockey viewership depends more on involved markets than particular “star power,” it may be this one. This series featured Oilers’ star Connor McDavid, whose accolades include five Art Ross Trophies as league scoring leader, three Hart Trophies and four Ted Lindsay Awards as league MVP (voted by media and players respectively), the first-ever Conn Smythe Trophy (playoff MVP) given to a skater in a losing cause last season, and countless “best player in the league” claims from members of the media.
The series also featured 2024-25 goal-scoring leader Leon Drasaitl of the Oilers, plus well-known Panthers including Sam Bennett, Sergei Bobrovsky, and Brad Marchand. And the rematch aspect definitely helped these teams’ personalities be known more widely. But, unlike with the Warriors-Cavaliers duels in the NBA last decade, a star-heavy rematch here didn’t pay U.S. ratings dividends.
That adds to the growing body of data seen over the last decades that the NHL’s largest U.S. numbers come not when it features particular stars (an argument many have advocated for, and one NBC even tried at one point, to lackluster results), but rather a short list of franchises that draw strong in-market and national ratings. While there’s an argument that stars matter more than teams for championship ratings in MLB and the NBA, that hasn’t really been the case in the NHL, with a particular subset of U.S. teams producing the best ratings.
That’s an interesting angle to consider with comments from those like ESPN’s Steve Levy, who have suggested that McDavid “might look elsewhere” rather than re-sign in Edmonton ahead of his contract expiration following next season. If McDavid did wind up on a U.S. team, but not a traditional ratings powerhouse, would that actually help ratings much? That remains to be seen, but viewers certainly didn’t flock to this Final because of him (or to last year’s, which was a notable drop from a 2022 series with two U.S. teams).
Setting aside conspiracy theories, the NHL can’t control which teams show up in the Final. And the Final ratings are only part of the roller-coaster picture the league saw this season. The biggest positive note was the 4 Nations Face-Off, which drew a record-shattering 9.3 million average U.S. viewers for the U.S.-Canada final, more than triple Game 6 of this Stanley Cup Final, and 4.4 million viewers for a preliminary-round U.S. clash with Canada on ABC. The tournament also generated unusual breakthrough discussions.
While best-on-best international ratings are unlikely to ever be replicated in most domestic leagues, the NHL did see at least somewhat of a regular-season boost immediately after that event. And the league has taken note, canceling its planned 2026 All-Star Game and pivoting to some kind of international event ahead of hockey at the 2026 Winter Olympics, as well as the return of the World Cup of Hockey in 2028.
The NHL also got another mammoth event this season that could have been a potential ratings boon with Alexander Ovechkin’s quest for Wayne Gretzky’s all-time NHL goal-scoring record. The run-up saw more nationally-televised Capitals games, and TNT set their regular-season non-Winter Classic audience record with 905,000 average viewers for the actual record-breaking game, despite it being a non-exclusive broadcast. That moment also sparked breakthrough sports discussions, albeit maybe not the ones the league would have preferred.
However, neither the 4 Nations event nor Ovechkin’s chase helped the NHL’s overall regular season or playoff ratings much overall. Even the Capitals’ two playoff series before their elimination didn’t help the overall playoff picture. And this season also saw an all-time low (920,000 viewers on TNT) for the Winter Classic, prompting a shift to Jan. 2 next year (a game which will see the defending Cup champion Panthers host the New York Rangers).
The NHL’s overall U.S. national ratings were down 12% across ESPN and TNT this regular season, and saw 31% and 20% declines on those networks respectively through the conference finals. Some of that was about the increased presence of Canadian teams deep in the playoffs, but another part of it was shorter series, especially in the conference finals (which both went five games this year compared to both going six games last year). Again, those factors aren’t under league control, but the drops still aren’t great.
Overall, the NHL certainly isn’t doomed by these season and playoff ratings. Their TNT and ESPN deals run through the 2027-28 season, and they seem to have been working fine for both sides so far. And while the NBA/NHL juggling will continue for ESPN, the NHL may get even more of a TNT spotlight in that network’s upcoming post-NBA era.
The Stanley Cup Final in particular should get a viewership boost next year regardless of which teams wind up there, due to its return to broadcast TV with ABC. However, it’s at the least notable that the NHL got two remarkable moments this season with the 4 Nations event and Ovechkin’s chase, and while both produced some localized ratings bumps, they didn’t help rescue an otherwise-down overall picture.