Many hockey fans are concerned about the sport's popularity in Canada after the ratings for game one of the Stanley Cup final were revealed. Despite the fact that the Oilers are in the finals, ratings in Canada have only shown marginal improvements over the previous year. One would imagine that ratings in the country would be at or near all-time highs, considering no Canadian team has made the finals since 2011. When you compare the ratings to those of other sports, the comparison becomes even worse as well. When the Toronto Raptors made the NBA finals in 2019, more than 8 million Canadians alone tuned in. <q>The few ratings numbers that have been released haven't been great. They're up in Canada, but not up in a way that suggests the Oilers have captivated any non-sports obsessives. According to the NHL, seven million people across North America watched Game 1. When the Toronto Raptors were rolling to the 2019 NBA championship, the nightly number crested eight million. And that was just in Canada.</q> <div align='center'><blockquote class='twitter-tweet' data-lang='en'><a href='https://twitter.com/globeandmail/status/1801743067680281051'> </a></blockquote></div> One fan offered a potential solution, moving the playoffs up. Currently, the finals are always decided in June, which is admittedly quite late in the year for hockey. Perhaps if the league moved the season up a month, there would be more interest by the end of the season. <q>It ends waaaaaaaaaaaay too late. People have moved on to summer activities. And I still watch every game so don't think of me as anything other than a hardcore fan.</q> <div align='center'><blockquote class='twitter-tweet' data-lang='en'><a href='https://twitter.com/noakesington/status/1802132225397264885'> </a></blockquote></div> That being said, other fans have pushed back on this narrative, saying that ratings are very healthy this year. Overall, ratings are up quite a bit this season, but much of these gains are coming from American Markets, not Canadian ones. <q>The numbers say viewership is way up. Before the finals started, this was the most watched NHL playoffs in the US since 1996. Conference finals were up 34% compared to last year. Most watched NHL playoffs in North America since 2018.</q> <div align='center'><blockquote class='twitter-tweet' data-lang='en'><a href='https://twitter.com/saskrushfans/status/1802078290913759354'> </a></blockquote></div> The NHL certainly seems to be more focused on growing the game in the states, so it makes sense that this would be the case, but that does not mean they can simply ignore Canadian markets. Hopefully next year we will see the game take a big step forward. Source: OilersDaily <a href='https://www.oilersdaily.com/nhl/stanley-cup/tv-ratings-for-stanley-cup-final-take-a-shocking-turn-in-canada' class='lien_marqueur' target='_blank' rel='noopener'>TV ratings for Stanley Cup Final take a shocking turn in Canada</a>