Minnesota Hockey TV Schedule Released

The Big Ten announced the 2014-15 TV broadcast schedule for Mens Hockey Monday afternoon.  The good news is that the Gophers are still the most broadcast team in the nation.  The bad news is that the schedule will be pared down this year and only 27 of the Gophers 36 games will be aired on live TV this season.  The main reason for the decrease in televised games?  Fox Sports North has cut their game load significantly, only airing 12 games this season down from 19 a year ago.  Where will you see the major changes?  Unfortunately if you are a season ticket holder like me, it will be the road games.  All but two of the Gophers home games (not counting the exhibitions) will be broadcast on TV this season.  The lone stragglers?  The Championship game of the Mariucci Classic (where the Gophers could face UMASS-Lowell), and the second to last home game of the season against Penn State.  The latter game will go untelevised due to Wild and Timberwolves conflicts on FSN/FSN+ and the Big Ten Basketball Tournament/ other college basketball conference tournaments on BTN/ ESPN Family of networks.

As of now, Gopher fans will see a total of seven road games that will not be televised live.  The major issue is not only is FSN willing to commit to the expense of covering available road games, but with the new college hockey conferences come multiple television contracts.  The opening two games for the Gophers at the IceBreaker Classic in South Bend, Indiana will not be on TV.  Notre Dame is the host of the tournament, and they and Hockey East have a TV contract with NBCSports Network.  Unfortunately, they have decided to not pick up those games for tv, however, if the Gophers would advance to play Notre Dame in the Championship Game on Sunday, that game would be streamed on NBCSports.com.  The Gophers two road games in Boston over Thanksgiving Weekend will also not be aired on TV.  Hockey East announced their composite TV schedule as well today, and Minnesota @ Boston College and Minnesota @ Northeastern were not on it.  The Gophers two road games against former WCHA foes will also as of now not be televised.  The Gophers will play home and home series against both St. Cloud State and UMD this fall.  However, the road games currently will not be televised.  However, these are the games that are most likely to be added to the tv broadcast schedule via either local broadcast options, such as SCSU's broadcasts on local cable in the Twin Cities, or UMD's local MY9 broadcasts that may get picked up by FSN. The final road games not televised will be the Gophers Big Ten opening series at Michigan State.  The Friday night game will be televised live on Fox Sports Detroit, but will be tape delayed on FSN+ in Minnesota due to Wild/ Timberwolves conflicts.  Unfortunately the Gophers just lost the lottery for that game as Penn State vs Wisconsin is on ESPNNews, and Michigan vs Ohio State is on BTN.  The Saturday game is a casualty to FSN's no travel policy this season, as this is a game that they would have broadcast last season, but this year will be left to radio alone.

So if you are a Gopher fan who does not have season tickets, it will be just a slight bummer for you.  If you have season tickets and will see all the home games live, then this is a kick in the pants, as a majority of the road games will be radio only.  The only shining light is that the Gopher radio team of Wally Shaver and Frank Mazocco is the best in the business, and Gopher fans will not have to suffer while listening to radio broadcasts of their favorite team, something many other teams can't say.

One other unknown is if BTN2go will stream all of the Gopher games that will air on FSN/FSN+ like they did a season ago.  No announcement has been made either way, but would assume that it will most likely occur.

The other thing to remember, though many will chose not to, is that we are really still in the best position of any college team in the nation when it comes to games on TV.  Hell, Boston College has home games against Minnesota and Michigan this season that won't even be on TV in Boston!  While we are losing some games, we are adding more national games so that Gophers fans outside of the Upper Midwest can enjoy more.  With 11 games on BTN and another four on the ESPN Family of networks (pray for Buccigross and not some random tennis announcer) the Gophers will gain an even larger national presence, and piss off our rivals even more.  And that's a good thing.  The full Gopher schedule with game times and TV networks is below:

Note that all games of  the Big Ten Tournament will be televised on BTN.