Dusty Saunders: NHL has backing of NBC's billions

On April 18, the sports world was concentrating on the NBA playoffs, the new baseball season and the NFL's future.
So an important story basically fell through the cracks.
That's the day the NHL and NBC Sports signed a record-breaking (for the NHL), 10-year television and media rights deal, beginning with the 2011-12 season.
NHL commissioner Gary Bettman called the agreement "the most significant U.S. media rights deal in the league's history."
While professional sports executives are noted for their excessive hyperbole, it's difficult to disagree with Bettman's assessment.
The record-setting deal is worth more than $2 billion.
Equally important: NBC will pay the NHL a rights fee. In the previous six-year contract, the network and the league shared profits — and losses.
The new deal allows the NHL to move up the television financial ladder to the same rung with the NFL, the NBA and Major League Baseball.
It seems even more impressive because the NHL, long considered a TV stepchild in this country, discovered that ESPN and Turner Television also were were interested in a new TV package.
The new contract calls for NBC and Versus (which is operated by NBC) to deliver more nationally televised hockey to American fans than ever before.
Both will feature "Game of the Week" time slots during the regular season. The projection — 100 regular-season televised games — nearly doubles the number from the recently completed regular season.
The contract also calls for the first national distribution of all Stanley Cup playoff games. According to NBC Sports chairman Dick Ebersol, every postseason game will be televised in its entirety on NBC, Versus or "a major NBC Universal national cable channel."
NBC will continue to televise the popular outdoor NHL Winter Classic on New Year's Day. And college football will find major competition on Thanksgiving Friday, with NBC showing an NHL game nationally.
Also, look for a name change for Versus. The cable channel will have a moniker that has NBC in it.
Meanwhile, my interest in the current NHL playoffs deteriorated when the Detroit Red Wings were eliminated by the San Jose Sharks.
Why the Red Wings?
It's a nostalgia thing, dating to the halcyon days when the Avalanche battled the Red Wings for NHL supremacy. In those days, of course, I rooted hard for Joe Sakic and the Avs.