Sean McDonough on his new NHL play-by-play role, the league’s move to ESPN and hockey broadcasting history
Share this post:
When news broke in March that the NHL was heading to ESPN and Turner Sports next season, many hockey fans had two consistent questions:
• How will broadcasts change, if at all, from NBC’s approach?
• Will ESPN really prioritize hockey coverage more in its highlight-intensive sports news shows and debate-based programming?
Sean McDonough joined us for Friday’s “Breakfast With Benz” podcast to discuss those topics. He’ll be the lead play-by-play voice for the league’s broadcasts.
“I think the (game) coverage will be largely the same, with innovations and enhancements,” McDonough said. “You do the best you can to keep advancing it. But I don’t think there will be much of a difference in the way the game is covered. There is only so much you can do anyway. But I do think you will see a lot more coverage in programming at ESPN, and I think that is a great thing for the NHL.”
As for McDonough, he’s become one of the most versatile and highly regarded play-by-play broadcasters over the last 30 years. He’s tackled every sport from the NFL on ESPN’s “Monday Night Football” broadcasts to Major League Baseball, NBA and NCAA college basketball and football.
He hasn’t done a ton of hockey of late. However, McDonough has called NHL and college games in the past. He was on the CBS call at the 1998 Olympics. And McDonough says his professional career started by calling Hockey East games after he graduated from Syracuse University.
“My first job out of college in the mid-’80s was doing college hockey on NESN,” McDonough said.
Among the players McDonough covered on those broadcasts was Penguins coach Mike Sullivan, who was at Boston University at the time.
“I have always wanted to continue doing hockey. I’m glad I have the opportunity to do it,” McDonough said. “I have a lot of friends around the sport who I am looking forward to connecting with again more closely.”
In terms of his approach, McDonough says he’s going to enjoy calling hockey again because the nature of the sport allows him to dovetail the visual elements of a television broadcast with his roots on the radio side.
“One of the reasons I love doing hockey is that I enjoy the pace of it,” McDonough explained. “Mike Emrick is widely regarded as the best hockey play-by-play guy of our era, and I think deservedly so. Part of what I enjoy is that you can almost do more of a radio-style call as he did on TV because the puck moves so fast. You need to identify people. That’s part of the fun of it for me.”
In the podcast, McDonough also shares his fondness for other NHL broadcasting greats such as Mike Lange and Dan Kelly. We talk about potential color analyst partners and the depth of talent ESPN announced for the upcoming season. Plus, we get into the craft of calling hockey and some of the challenges it presents.
Listen: Tim Benz and Sean McDonough discuss NHL coverage on ESPN and Turner Sports next season.