The NHL on TNT is entering its fourth season, and they’re kicking coverage of the 2024-25 NHL regular season off Wednesday night.
They’re doing so with a special 90-minute edition of the pre-game show NHL on TNT Face Off beginning at 6 p.m. Eastern, followed by the Pittsburgh Penguins-New York Rangers game at 7:30 p.m. and the Colorado Avalanche-Vegas Golden Knights game at 10 Eastern.
Ahead of that, Face Off analysts Anson Carter and Paul Bissonnette spoke to media on a call Monday, with Carter saying he thinks the show has continued to get better over time as the cast has grown more familiar with each other.
“The main thing for us is we’re super comfortable with each other now. We’ve been together for quite some time. And the beauty of our show is it really is just a continuation of us hanging out away from the camera. Nothing really changes from that aspect as far as what we do on camera; I think we have a good grasp of who we are as individuals. And that doesn’t really change and hasn’t really changed.”
The praised show Face Off (which will feature Carter, Bissonnette, Wayne Gretzky , Henrik Lundqvist, and host Liam McHugh in its regular-season debut Wednesday ) is interesting for its combinations of funny and absurd sketches and moments , notable interviews , guest appearances , and in-depth technical discussions. Carter said they try hard to balance all that.
“Just the fun aspect of it, we understand that, yeah, we can do some funny things; we call it skits and bits. But we can also lean into the serious side of things and also break down the technical aspect of hockey, too. So I think we’re very aware and very conscious of making sure we don’t lean in one direction or the other. And I think that all really comes down to Liam being a great bus driver because we just kind of follow his lead.”
Bissonnette said the time they’ve had working together to this point has made the on-air product smoother.
“The chemistry, now that it’s our fourth year in, like Ace said, it’s the continuation of what’s going on behind the scenes. We all love to talk shop. We don’t really stay pigeonholed in one thing, and we like to kind of cover a lot of different things, be serious, or be funny, do some silly stuff. …Going back to what Ace said, we’ve always got along. But now we kind of know each other a bit like family. So it’s really helped in that regard, and I can’t wait to get going.”
He said another notable change for them came when original panelist Rick Tocchet left to take over as the Vancouver Canucks’ head coach last January . That led to them bringing in former New York Rangers’ goalie Henrik Lundqvist more (including for a Green Day-inspired farewell to Tocchet), but also led to a general rotation in the seat Tocchet once held. And Bissonnette said that’s been positive for the show.
“From an evolution standpoint, once we lost Toc to a head coaching job with the Vancouver Canucks, obviously with Hank not being there all the time, we kind of have this rotating seat, which makes it fun,” he said. “We can have these one or two-offs, we’re able to have, like, Jon Cooper come in , or Chris Chelios .
“That’s added a really fun element, where all of a sudden you have ‘Story time with Chris Chelios’ on TNT one night. And I’m sure you’re probably going to be seeing more of him. So it’s also developing the chemistry with other people rather than just the originals or the quote-unquote ‘set crew.’ From an evolution standpoint, I’d say that’s probably the most notable thing over the last year or two.”
Carter said Lundqvist has been a great addition, and it’s been fun to show viewers a side of him they might not have imagined.
“I don’t know if it’s so much about what we’ve learned, but rather what we’ve been able to show the viewer on who Hank really is,” he said. “You think of Hank as a stately guy, as an ambassador, always well-poised. But we love bringing out Angry Hank. That’s the fire and the intensity that his teammates would talk about that you don’t really see, behind closed doors.
“And you don’t see it very often. But we think we know Hank well enough that we get to push his buttons a little bit. And it takes a little peek behind the curtain to see what makes him tick.”
Beyond the ability to troll Lundqvist, Carter said he’s a terrific addition for the goaltending knowledge he brings.
“From a technical perspective, he’s as good as it gets with the game; we’ve got a lot of former goaltenders on our broadcasts, so I think we’re pretty fortunate with having people break down the game from that position, but Hank is right there. But I just think that peek behind the curtain is what we have the most fun with, letting the fans see Angry Hank and not so much King Henrik all the time.”
Bissonnette backed Carter up on that, talking about Lundqvist’s technical knowledge and ability to communicate that.
“His intensity, for sure, is probably the one thing that I would point out. To do it to the level that he did it, but also to have absorbed it from his teachers, and he often talks about the guys who passed down their knowledge to him. And how he’s able to articulate it on the broadcast; some people do it and are just like, ‘I don’t know, I did it.’ But he obviously was a student of the game. He’s a professional coach. And how he’s able to articulate it to the fans is such an unreal dynamic.”
Bissonette added that bringing in Lundqvist more regularly has been particularly beneficial after Tocchet’s exit.
“Obviously, we lost Toc and [his ability to break down] the intricacies,” Bissonnette said. “He would do that from a coaching perspective. And when he went to B.C., we replaced him with Hank, who’s doing that from the goalie position, arguably the most important position in hockey. It just added a whole different element to the broadcast. And his fire and his professional approach is unreal and it’s unmatched.”
Carter said the core team of him, Bissonnette, and McHugh, as well as the production team, has worked hard to make Face Off a welcoming show for recurring analysts like Lundqvist and less-frequent guest analysts.
“It was important for the guys in the studio to create an environment where whether you do this on a regular basis, or if you just come on like Biz talked about with Coop as a one-off, you feel comfortable being on set, you feel comfortable being on air. I think that’s one thing that all the guys on the desk really take a lot of pride in, making sure that if someone is in there for the first time or the 1,000th time, they feel really comfortable being with us because that’s going to resonate on camera.”
He said it’s also important for the Face Off crew to pay attention to the TNT game broadcasts and amplify notable points raised there by analysts who might not have had enough time to discuss them fully.
“I feel like part of our job is to support what the guys calling the game are doing,” Carter said. “Because the game is so fast…they might not have enough time during the broadcast to really dig deep into it. So we try to really support what they’re seeing with their eyes sometimes and dig a little deeper. If we hear something that Edzo [Eddie Olczyk) or Bouch [Brian Boucher] or Panger [Darren Pang] or Jackie [Redmond] or Botts [Jennifer Botterill] said, whoever it might be calling the game, we just try to dig in. Because we also realize that during the game broadcast, they only have so much time to break that down while the game is going on.”
For Bissonnette, he may be in his fourth year on NHL on TNT coverage, but he’s still relatively new to that arena after coming in following a playing career and then time with podcasts like Barstool Sports’ Spittin’ Chiclets (where he remains a co-host, alongside fellow former player Ryan Whitney, Bruins’ blogger Rear Admiral, and producer Mike Grinnell). He said he’s enjoying his time on TV with TNT, though, especially with how they’ve encouraged his less conventional moments .
“I love it. It’s loose. And that’s kind of where I came from, as far as my Spittin’ Chiclets background, it’s more conversational-based and a little less structured in a sense than a traditional broadcast. But the tone was set by NBA on TNT ; they kind of set the mold, and we’re just trying to basically create our own version of that.
“And I think that’s basically TNT’s model to begin with. And it’s been awesome; I’m so grateful, and we have such a fun team. And the people behind the scenes are what make it as well. They run a tight ship, but yet make it so fun.”
More on TNT’s opening-week coverage can be found here .
The post Anson Carter and Paul Bissonette talk ‘NHL on TNT Face Off’ evolution and bringing out ‘Angry Hank’ appeared first on Awful Announcing .
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