Games 1 and 2 of the Stanley Cup Final Have Target Dates Set

The Stanley Cup Final is always in a bit of a flux, due to the flexible nature of things like series length, the NBA Finals, and the television networks launching new summer programs.

This year will have at least one of those factors out of the way, as the NBA Finals aren’t begin until June 12th, allowing the NHL to pretty much schedule most of their championship series how they see fit. According to NBC’s PR dep’t, Games 1 and 2 of the 2012 Stanley Cup Final are planned for Wednesday, May 30th and Saturday, June 2nd at 8 p.m. ET. These are merely target dates, but one would have to think unless we see sweeps both ways, this is how things will go. The current target date for the conference finals to end is either May 27th or May 28th based on the current schedule.

One would imagine this means NBC and NBC Sports Network (taking Games 3 & 4) will be going on a Monday/Wednesday/Saturday rotation with the Final, as is tradition, with the NBA usually going on a Tuesday/Thursday/Sunday plan. It’s kind of a shame, however, the NBC didn’t use the NBA’s late start as a chance to see if getting the Stanley Cup Final off of little-watched Saturday nights wouldn’t help ratings. I’d love to see them try a Thursday/Sunday (5/31 and 6/3) start, then follow up with Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday (6/5, 6/7, 6/9) before moving to Monday and Wednesday for the final two games (6/11, 6/13) before the NBA Finals start.

Then again, the dates are obviously not set in stone and there’s still time to change them. For now, however, there will likely be hockey on May 30th and June 2nd. Set your calendars.

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