The lights will be shining a little bit brighter on Wednesday night when the Prince Albert Raiders welcome the Medicine Hat Tigers to the Art Hauser Centre.
Wednesday night’s game will have plenty of viewers from outside Prince Albert as the game will be featured as the WHL’s game of the week as part of the Wednesday Night in the Dub program.
Wednesday Night in the Dub began back in November with the league picking a feature matchup that makes the game available to stream online free of charge for hockey fans on either WHL Live or YouTube.
Taylor Rocca is the director of Public Relations and Brand Communications for the Western Hockey League. In an interview with the Daily Herald, Rocca says the idea came to light because of the influence of new WHL commissioner Dan Near who is in his first full season since replacing Ron Robison halfway through last season.
“He’s really challenged not only our clubs, but the staff in the office to look at the way we do business and think about things a little bit differently. That led us down the path to exploring the idea of streaming the occasional game on YouTube. Taking down the barriers to access, things like a paywall or needing to create an account on a streaming platform. We wanted to take those down just to see what sort of response that would get. We came up with Wednesday Night in the Dub which so far has been a big success. We wanted to find a day of the week that could serve as a pillar within the schedule.”
Previous Wednesday Night in the Dub matchups this season have included the Medicine Hat Tigers taking on the Everett Silvertips late last month, the Victoria Royals visiting the Vancouver Giants and Prince George Cougars and Tri-City Americans.
Prince Albert was featured on Wednesday Night in the Dub back on Dec. 18, which was an 8-5 loss to the Calgary Hitmen at the Scotiabank Saddledome.
Rocca says the lack of paywall for fans to stream the games has led to a significant increase in viewership compared to an average game.
“Part of Wednesday Night in the Dub was to pilot and see how the audience would respond. When I compare viewership for Wednesday Night in the Dub with viewership on WHL Live for just an average game, our audience has grown fourfold. We’ve seen a 400% increase from an average game that’s behind the paywall to a free view game that’s available on YouTube.”
At the time of publishing, the schedule for Wednesday Night in the Dub has been announced through next week when the Saskatoon Blades visit the Lethbridge Hurricanes.
Rocca says the league will pick the matchups for the remainder of the regular season based on the players that can be profiled and what the game would mean for both teams in terms of playoff implications.
“As we get further further down the schedule here in the regular season, Wednesdays get a little bit heavier. We really want to focus on profiling star players and profiling key or exciting match-ups that bring some heavy hitting teams to the table. We look at each Wednesday, we see what’s on the schedule. We take into consideration what every given match-up might mean from a playoff race standpoint, what sort of star players we might be able to spotlight and we have a conversation around that.”
The idea of Wednesday Night in the Dub has started similar concepts in the other two CHL leagues with the Quebec Maritimes Junior Hockey League (QMJHL) featuring a weekly freeview game on Thursday nights and the Ontario Hockey League (OHL) doing the same on Fridays.
Rocca says the idea spreading across the CHL shows that fans are interested in junior hockey from coast to coast.
“When I look at that as a whole, starting out west and moving out east, what it says to me is whether you’re in B.C., Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, whatever it might be out west or Ontario, Quebec, there’s an appetite for junior hockey. People want to watch it. Folks in the communities where our clubs are located are passionate about it. The viewership that we’re seeing supports the notion that there’s a strong appetite for the game, so long as we make it relatively easy for people to access.”
The WHL has not announced any future plans in expanding the concept of Wednesday Night in the Dub at the time of publishing. Rocca says the league wants to get more viewers on games and to appeal to fans to be interested in teams outside their own market.
“I wouldn’t say there’s nothing that’s off the table right now. Ultimately, we want to make it easy for fans to consume the product. Whether they’re at home, whether they’re in the rink, whether they’re on the road, we want people watching. The more the people watch, the more passionate and dedicated they’re going to be, the more loyal they’re going to feel towards their local team and we want to extend that interest beyond the local market too.”
With YouTube being the most popular video streaming platform on the internet with a global reach, the WHL is seeing fans from all over the globe tune in to watch the games. Rocca says he has noticed fans are sticking around and staying engaged with the league.
“We’ve seen folks watching games from what I would call non-traditional Western Hockey League territory. I don’t expect somebody in Tennessee necessarily to be heavily engaged and knowledgeable on what’s going on in the Western Hockey League. We’ve had people from Tennessee watching the games. We’ve had people from New Jersey, Australia and different parts of Europe. It’s not like they stumble upon a game, watch for a couple minutes and say ‘I don’t know what this is and I don’t really care’. The product has been captivating enough for people that are unfamiliar with it. They hang around, they watch and then they come back the next week, so it’s been really fun to see that.”
Wednesday night’s game between the Raiders and Tigers will be available free to stream on YouTube or on the league’s facebook page.
sports@paherald.sk.ca
