The Minnesota Wild are ditching their old regional sports network setup and skating into a new era of team-controlled TV. Starting next season, most local broadcasts will shift to a Wild-branded channel built in partnership with the National Hockey League, replacing the FanDuel Sports North feed that folded earlier this year. The team says viewers will still get a mix of cable, over-the-air and paid streaming options, with familiar broadcast voices sticking around even as the league steps in on the production side.
According to the Star Tribune, the Wild and the NHL have struck an NHL-backed media partnership that will put roughly 70 of the club’s games on the new Wild channel, produced with league resources. The rest of the 84-game slate will land on national outlets such as ESPN and TNT. Team officials say the Wild channel will occupy the same tier in cable and satellite packages that FanDuel Sports North used to hold, and that a small batch of games will still air over the air in-market. The season is set to open Oct. 1 in Nashville, with the home opener Oct. 3 against Boston at Grand Casino Arena in St. Paul, and KFAN FM 100.3 will remain the team’s radio home.
Why the NHL is stepping in
The league has been quietly building a centralized production operation for clubs that lost traditional regional sports network partners, offering studio programming, premium game production, replay and advanced graphics to fill the gap. As reported by Sports Business Journal, the NHL is making a significant multi-season investment in NHL Productions and will supply shared personnel and technology while teams keep control over distribution and advertising inventory. League executives say the setup is designed to upgrade production quality, give sponsors cleaner local inventory and hang on to traditional linear TV carriage whenever possible.
How fans will watch
Under the new arrangement, the Wild and the NHL are splitting production costs, but the team will run the show on production, distribution, sales and marketing. That lets the club keep longtime broadcast personalities in place and maintain local control over sponsorships. Original shows such as "Beyond Our Ice" and "Becoming Wild" are expected to air alongside game telecasts, and the TV booth will stay familiar: play-by-play voice Anthony LaPanta and lead analyst Ryan Carter will remain on the call, with Kevin Gorg, Katie Storm and Wes Walz in the studio and guest analysts like Alex Stalock and Lou Nanne dropping in for select games, according to the Star Tribune. “The band’s back,” Wild chief revenue officer Mitch Helgerson said, as the team targets what it calls “A1” local production quality while expanding digital viewing options.
What comes next
Exact channel placements, streaming platforms and subscription pricing are still to come, with the team saying those details will be released before the puck drops in October. In-market blackout rules will remain in effect. The Wild’s plan is part of a growing NHL experiment, joining similar league-supported arrangements in Carolina, Columbus and St. Louis as local production services expand. Sports Business Journal notes that the strategy borrows from league-driven local models used in other sports. For official viewing options and subscription information, fans can head to the team’s broadcast page on the Minnesota Wild's site.
