Normally the NHL is coming out of the dog days of the regular season in late February as teams begin the final push for a playoff berth. However, most are hoping after a thrilling 4 Nations Face-Off that hockey can continue its momentum.

One of the first tests will be Saturday night when ESPN carries the Stadium Series matchup between the Columbus Blue Jackets and Detroit Red Wings from Ohio Stadium.

“The season feels very different to me this year,” said ESPN’s Steve Levy, who will host the outdoor game. “I think the players that were involved or those not involved were energized by watching. The NHL has a ton of momentum really at a perfect time, and it has kick started the final quarter of the season.”

It also doesn’t hurt that the league has plenty of storylines coming off 4 Nations. Washington’s Alexander Ovechkin needs 12 goals to surpass Wayne Gretzky’s career NHL record of 894 while the league’s trade deadline is one week away.

ESPN announced this week that it has added seven additional games, including two featuring Ovechkin and the Capitals.

“That keeps the hockey interest going overall, and that helps motivate us internally as well as externally. So 4 Nations into Ovechkin into Stadium Series, that’s a great position for all of us to be in right now,” said Linda Schulz, who oversees ESPN’s NHL production.

The Stadium Series usually has significance due to the location, but it carries huge implications in the Eastern Conference playoff race. After Thursday night’s 5-2 victory, Columbus is tied with Detroit for the first wild-card spot. Both have 66 points, and are four points clear of Ottawa, Boston and the New York Rangers.

The Red Wings haven’t been to the Stanley Cup playoffs since 2016 while the Blue Jackets are in contention even while mourning the deaths of Johnny Gaudreau and his brother Matthew in August.

Besides the Ohio-Michigan rivalry being manifested on ice, Ohio Stadium should provide a great backdrop because college stadiums seem to be more conducive to NHL Stadium Series games with not a lot of sideline room. The fans are also more on top of the rink and closer to the ice compared to when the outdoor games have taken place in baseball parks.

“The NHL does a really good job of finding these iconic settings. And ‘The Horseshoe’ just screams that,” Levy said. “If you’re naming five iconic college football stadiums, this is one. Just like ‘The Big House’ in Michigan (which has also hosted a Stadium Series game) is on that list.”

With the game being outdoors, ESPN will use a drone to capture some of the views as well as testing some new virtual graphics.

While Canada’s 4-3 overtime victory over the United States in the 4 Nations championship averaged a record 9.3 million viewers, Levy and ESPN are hoping that some stick around the rest of the season and going into the playoffs.

“We’re not going to keep them all. But what percentage of those same fans who were wowed by 4 Nations an we keep a little longer? Because everybody in this sport knows once we get to the Stanley Cup playoffs, you can get them to that point. They’re going to stick around regardless of what teams are in just because the postseason so intense and crazy,” Levy said.

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AP NHL: https://apnews.com/hub/nhl

The mayor hopes to wrap up the arena negotiations this summer.

It appears that the National Basketball Association Commissioner Adam Silver has one less arena problem that needs his lobbying expertise. In Memphis, Mayor Paul Young thinks an agreement to renovate the city’s arena which is the home of the Memphis Grizzlies franchise, will be reached by the end of the summer and that the $550 million needed to modernize the facility will be available. However, that $550 million price tag may be going up due to American tariffs on steel. “We’re working toward getting to an agreement on the principals that go in a lease by the end of the summer,” Young stated.

Young said that there was a multi-layer approach in the lease process. “Getting the dollar amount was certainly the first hurdle that we wanted to overcome, making sure that we have all of the dollars to actually execute the project. Then it was a matter of really working through what the lease is actually going to look like and what the terms are going to look like, and our attorneys are continuing to work hard at getting all of those parameters in place.” The Grizzlies ownership deal with the city of Memphis ends in 2029, so time is becoming a factor in the negotiations. Part of the $550 million in funding could come from an increase to the Shelby County hotel-motel tax after the Tennessee legislature approved a bill in 2024 that will allow the county to increase it. There is no word on how much money that the Grizzlies’ ownership might kick into the renovation cost. In 2000, Vancouver Grizzlies owner Michael Heisley decided to look for a new home for his business and kicked the tires in six cities, Las Vegas, Anaheim, St. Louis,  New Orleans, Louisville and Memphis. Heisley choose Memphis. The Memphis arena opened in 2004 and is considered outdated.

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Mayor Paul Young

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Today’s question: What is something under the radar to keep an eye on this weekend in the NTT INDYCAR SERIES season opener, the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg presented by RP Funding (noon ET Sunday, FOX, FOX Deportes, INDYCAR Radio Network)?

Curt Cavin: I keep asking myself, who is the next big thing in this series? In a season-opening race with loads of faces in new places, I keep coming back to Christian Lundgaard joining Arrow McLaren. I’m not ready to say the 23-year Dane can win Sunday’s race, but he has a street circuit victory in this series – in Toronto in 2023 – and has raced well in St. Petersburg (two top-11 finishes with Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing). In this season opener, Lundgaard will drive for an organization that has excelled in St. Petersburg the past two years. Pato O’Ward finished second in 2023 and won last year’s race; Alexander Rossi finished fourth and sixth, respectively.

Eric Smith: I feel like I’ve been on the Scott Dixon storyline all offseason, and I’d be remiss if I stopped entering the 2025 season opener. Remarkably, Dixon has reached victory lane 58 times at 28 different tracks but is 0-for-20 on the streets of St. Petersburg. However, the six-time NTT INDYCAR SERIES champion has four podium finishes in his last eight starts on this track, and his seventh-place finish last season continued his streak of finishing eighth or better every year since 2016. Also, among the last seven victories for Dixon, four have come on city streets (Toronto 2022, Nashville 2023, Long Beach 2024, Detroit 2024). The Chip Ganassi Racing driver boasted a series-leading 3.0 average finish on street tracks last season. Add it up, and I think he’s primed to earn his fourth season-opening victory, joining 2003 and again in 2008 at Homestead-Miami Speedway to go along with 2020 at Texas Motor Speedway. He won three of his six championships in those seasons.

Paul Kelly: There are two “under the radar” stories I’m watching this weekend, mainly due to competition tweaks and how they will affect team’s strategies. One is the switch in Firestone’s weekend tire allotment at each event, as each team will get an additional set of Firestone Firehawk alternate-compound tires and one less set of Firestone Firehawk primary-compound tires, with five sets each. This may force teams to manage their tires more carefully over the weekend, especially at circuits where the primaries show an advantage. But the main “down low” story I’m watching is the ability for cars to restart on track – and now in the pits – without the AMR INDYCAR Safety Team due to the new hybrid units. There was only one street course race last season after the hybrid debuted in July at Mid-Ohio, at Toronto, so we really haven’t seen how fewer yellows at fraught, bumpy street circuits like St. Pete will change team’s fuel and tire strategies. But there is almost one certainty: The onboard starters will create more green flag action, something everyone wants.