After a strong start, viewership for the Stanley Cup Playoffs has remained hot through the second weekend of play.
The first nine days of the Stanley Cup playoffs averaged 1.1 million viewers across ESPN and TNT Sports, up 82% from the same point of last season and the highest average on record at this point of the postseason. The previous high was set in 1994, when only ten windows aired nationally in the first nine days of play, and the previous high in a postseason where all games aired nationally — which did not happen for the first time until 2012 — was 800,000 in 2024.
In particular, the ESPN networks were averaging 1.2 million viewers and TNT Sports 1.1 million — up 101 and 67 percent respectively from last season.
Note that Nielsen did not begin including out-of-home viewing in its estimates until 2020, only began doing so in 100 percent of markets a year ago, and is mere months into a new methodology that combines its traditional panel with “Big Data” from smart TVs and set-top boxes. Those changes will generally skew historical comparisons, though they would not explain such sizable year-over-year increases.
The most-watched game of this past weekend was Saturday’s Stars-Wild Game 4, which drew a combined 0.8 rating and 1.92 million viewers across TBS and truTV — officially the most-watched opening round game ever on TNT Sports, excluding Game 7s. Penguins-Flyers followed with a 0.8 and 1.85 million, airing in a window that overlapped with breaking news coverage.
The Penguins-Flyers series has delivered several of the largest audiences so far this postseason, with Games 2 and 3 averaging both 1.63 million on ESPN and TNT Sports respectively.
While this year’s postseason field has benefited from the return of big market or traditional teams like the Flyers and Penguins (and Bruins), it should be noted that some of the largest audiences thus far have been for series featuring the Canadian and Sun Belt markets that have been a ratings drag in recent years.
On Sunday, ESPN averaged a 0.9 and 1.90 million for Lightning-Canadiens Game 4 — up from a Phillies-Cubs “Sunday Night Baseball” game on the network the same night last year (1.7M).
Other weekend numbers include 1.3 million for Avalanche-Kings and 1.1 million for the Sabres’ rout of the Bruins on TNT Sports Sunday afternoon, 1.1 million for Oilers-Ducks on ESPN Sunday night, and 1.1 million for Hurricanes-Senators in the first game of TNT Sports’ Saturday tripleheader.
Keep in mind that the NHL is the last of the four major sports that allows regional sports networks to carry coverage of opening round playoff games, meaning that each game has had additional viewers not included in the national average.
