Ratings game/Outdoor game

NBC sports: Released their version of the ratings for game three
announced as earning a 2.8 overnight rating and a 5 share, the best overnight rating for a Game 3 in six years. (2002 – Carolina-Detroit, 3.8/8)

The Penguins 3-2 victory over the Detroit Red Wings garnered an 18.2/28 in Detroit, trouncing the Detroit Pistons-Boston Celtics NBA Eastern Conference Final
head-to-head by more than 14 percent in "Hockeytown" (15.9/24).

The 2.8/5 was an 87 percent increase over last year's Game 3 on NBC (Anaheim-Ottawa, 1.5/3) but that was a Saturday night game which is traditionally a lower rating night.

Wednesday's Top Markets:
1. Pittsburgh, 33.1/47
2. Detroit, 18.2/28
3. Buffalo, 6.2/9
4. Columbus, 4.1/7
5. Minneapolis, 3.7/7

NYI Fan Central Comments:
A ton of spin both ways. Ottawa-Anaheim game three was played on a Saturday night which is traditionally a lower rating night.

I think it says a lot about how far hockey as fallen when Pittsburgh-Detroit is competing with Carolina-Detroit for ratings.

2.8 is not even in the same universe as Dallas-New Jersey about a decade ago. The Wings beat out the Pistons with basketball on cable and hockey on free television but with both on cable the Pistons won across the board.

NBC finished fourth for the night on broadcast with ratings down 34% from the programming they showed a year ago which is not good.

New York did a 1.6 according to WFAN and Francesa-Russo laughed off the New York hockey fans claiming a WNBA basketball game here had a higher rating than a conference finals hockey game last week.

Tsn.ca: Is confirming Detroit will play Chicago in the next outdoor game.

NYI Fan Central Comments:
Wake me when the league announces an official game, we have a few too many unofficial/official confirmations, someone call Al Trautwig.

Islander News Articles 5/28

Newsday: Greg Logan blogged on last night's Lighthouse meeting, the road ahead in the process as well as the political and enviormental hurdles the project will have to get through before final approval. It was written partly from a hockey perspective with Mike Bossy also in attendance.

NYI Fan Central Comments:
Hopefully Newsday has an update in the business section on the meeting. The LI Business News lags behind a day or so on these updates but has done a lot on the Lighthouse project. Will be interesting if/when the heavyweights like Smg/Al D'Amato, and the same folks who have been killing Coliseum projects back to the days of John Pickett start surfacing with their demands. Nice update today but this works kind of like Sheldon Silver in Manhattan where he can kill something simply because he feels like it regardless of what anyone thinks.

Mr Wang negotiated an out-clause in the Isles lease with the county if this project is rejected at some point but Smg's lease runs until 2014 and the television contract until 2030 makes any relocation highly unlikely because of the huge revenue the club receives in the deal.

Erie Times News: Victor Fernandes has an article on the NHL draft as Pierre McGuire envisions Drew Doughty as the next Denis Potvin with comments from several of the prospects.

Winnipeg Sun: Steve Simmons has an article about Wings scout Hakan Andersson and the success they have had with draft picks from Sweden starting with Henrik Zetterberg in relation to the 1999 draft with a lot on how Mattias Weinhandl was also targeted by the Wings but went to the Isles in the third round.

NYI Fan Central Comments:
This was the kind of thing I was writing about recently in terms of the Islanders drafts over close to a decade, no late round steals at the forward position, not even a mid or early round steal for that matter either.

Erie Times News: Victor Fernandes has an article on the NHL draft as Pierre McGuire envisions Drew Doughty as the next Denis Potvin with comments from several of the prospects.
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It should be noted for those watching Wednesday's finals on my cable guide Versus lists no postgame while Espn news is advertising all postgame interviews.

Makes little sense to me unless NBC-Versus-NHL Network simply do not work well together. Why not have a panel with an hour long postgame and full press conferences after months of Versus coverage. NBC will be cutting to local news quickly after games.

They did a special live program to show some ping pong balls for a half hour lottery, to not have finals postgame makes little sense but it's been happening for three years.
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Islander/Finals notables

Thanks for the e-mails on the outdoor game folks, but please just send your e-mail to Mayor Bloomberg, not to me. I have done what I can with this, it's up to you.

I will leave the link up until a decision is announced on the game. If you want our team involved you have to do your part, I do not know if it will help but it sure cannot hurt. Isles put in two years trying to make this game happen and I feel our team deserve to be in this game or no event like this should ever take place in New York.
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Eliteprospects.com
Has three rumor reports Tuesday of Islander prospect Kim Johansson moving to Sundsvall, Nyköping or Nybro with all three linked to a blog here.

NYI Fan Central Comments:
Take all this with a very large grain of salt but with Johansson needing to be signed within a week I listed it. I'm leaning toward cutting out eliteprospects.com from our updates because a few of them like this are linking to blogs I'm not sure are legitimate professional media sources and they have not been as reliable as they have been in the past. _______________________________________________________________________________
Finals notables:
My finals predictions of Pittsburgh in six from Hockey Night on LI Saturday with Osgood being exploited because he is not one of the new age goalies wearing all the extra padding is not looking too good right now. Guess that home ice advantage not being a big deal in today's NHL has me 0-3. (Laughing)

Having written that I did also say these clubs have never met and we'll see what will be the over-riding factor and that anything could happen.

It is getting old reading these 83 Oilers comparisons, Pittsburgh did not dominate during the regular season like Edmonton did in their conference that year. Fact is this Pittsburgh team is looking more like the 81-82 Oilers but played two average clubs in Philadelphia-Rangers who struggled to make the playoffs and a Ottawa club in a free fall but their overall talent and long-term potential is excellent.

Now they are meeting a good team playing well that dominated their conference all season, but Pittsburgh is going home and this will tell us whether we have a long series or a short series if their home winning streak is broken.

Gary Roberts looked like he did in the 2002 playoffs going after Jonsson's head last night. Only this time he's too old to charge in from center ice, garbage play.

These Versus ratings are not exactly great, are they double last year because they have more outlets in year three for people to watch? What does 1.8 on Versus translate to on a network with limited affiliates?

I guess we will find out when NBC takes over for game three. Personally I do not think any market makes that big a difference, the fact so many media did not even go to Detroit says all we need to know about what the sports editors think of hockey in general.

The New York media is not even showing the game highlights.

Best articles I have read from the major media on the finals are the ones wondering why Gary Bettman opens his press conferences with softball questions from NHL network to set the tone as David Shoalts in the Globe & Mail pointed out here.

It's about as pre-packaged as those rating reports coming from Versus media people.
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Newsday: Mark Herrmann does a feature with Robert Borzomi from Sunday, who has painted the Nassau Coliseum ice since day one which the Isles website linked to today with comments from Bryan Trottier, John Tonelli and Lorne Henning.

NYI Fan Central Comments:
Nice feature and well deserved, but it's long overdue for an update on pending free agents and a state of the Isles. If there is room in the print edition for a two part feature on this there should be room in the budget for information on the team. Kind of sad only Steve Zipay's Ranger blog is going live for the finals but all I can do here is point it out to everyone and ask why the Islander blog is not covering the finals?

The Oklahoman: Bob Hersom does a very good three part interview with former three time cup winner with the Islanders, Mike McEwen who talks about what is was like to play on those championship clubs.

Telegraph-Journal: Scott Briggs has a feature on former cup winning Islander Yvon Vautour who will enter New Brunswick sports shrine Saturday as he talks about being a part of a championship team with the Islanders.

Newsday: Noel Rubinton in the business blog of Newsday has more on Cablevision's purchase of the paper with more criticism for the deal and a link to the LI business news article on 5/23 and a Times article on the history of Newsday.

NYI Fan Central Comments:
I sent Mr Rubinton an e-mail about a week and a half ago asking what this means for the New York Islanders and their hockey coverage, to this point he did not respond.

Point Blank: Mr Botta answered a blog on the Islanders Hall of Fame regarding Bob Bourne and did a second video blog as a new feature (nice work) on John Tonelli.

NYI Fan Central Comments:
A few years earlier a relative of Bob Bourne sent the Sunday Post Soundoff of all places an e-mail about Bourne being under appreciated. As usual Charles Wang stepped up and did something about that to make up for past owners because it was the right thing to do. Hopefully names like Goring, Tonelli, Persson, Westphal and company also are added to that list in the coming years.

In the prospect section Igor Volkov transferred to another Russian club over the weekend.

The Star: Kevin McGran reports the draft prospects combine is underway in Toronto with the Isles (among several clubs) having wined and dined Paul Myers who is the fourth-ranked skater in North America according to the NHL's Central Scouting bureau. Meyer and as Alex Pieterangelo are asked and comment about being drafted by the Leafs.