“Inside The NHL”, Canadian broadcast schedules

The name of the highly anticipated new NHL docuseries has been revealed, and a new trailer delivers plenty of tidbits that will have hockey fans counting down the minutes until Faceoff: inside the NHL hits Prime Video worldwide on Friday, October 4.

We see William Nylander begging a Toronto Maple Leafs teammate, “Stop crying, brother,” and Connor McDavid screaming in the Edmonton Oilers locker room, “It’s the finals. Get a grip. Now!”

And that's just the tip of the iceberg of the six-part series produced by NHL Productions and Box to Box, the production company behind the acclaimed sports documentary series “Formula 1: Drive to Survive,” “Full Swing,” “Break Point” and more.

Since production on “Faceoff” began in February, film crews have had unprecedented access to the game’s most charismatic stars — a group of mostly twenty-somethings who grew up confident in front of the camera in the age of social media and are currently among the league’s top players.

And unlike NHL Productions' long-running documentary series such as “The Road to the NHL Winter Classic” or “Quest for the Stanley Cup,” the “Faceoff” series focuses less on teams and more on individual personalities.

Hockey players have a reputation for hiding their individuality within the context of their team sport, but Box to Box co-founder Paul Martin was pleasantly surprised by the response he received when he began speaking to players during the 2024 All-Star weekend in Toronto.

“You never know how those conversations are going to go,” Martin said. “But I think we were immediately encouraged by the investment of those players who said, 'Yeah, sounds kind of cool. Yeah, we'd like to be there.' That kind of went against what people had told us about hockey players.”

Nylander was one of the first players to embrace the concept. Episode 1 focuses on his long friendship – and rivalry – with David Pastrnak.

Other players included include Gabriel Landeskog, the captain of the Colorado Avalanche who spent the last two seasons on the injured list, Jacob Trouba, the captain of the New York Rangers, Quinn Hughes, the captain of the Vancouver Canucks, newly crowned Stanley Cup champion Matthew Tkachuk and three of the Edmonton players who took his Florida Panthers to the 7th Final: McDavid, Leon Draisaitl and Zach Hyman.

The fifth and sixth episodes are titled “Cup or Bust: Parts I and II.”

“When Florida goes up 3-0, you think the end is in sight,” Martin said of the production process. “And it's just the most amazing kind of comeback. When you see these episodes, they're extraordinary. I think you see a little bit of it in the trailer, but I think everyone is blown away by the sight of Connor in the middle of the fight.”

“Faceoff: Inside the NHL” is just one pillar of an expanded partnership between the NHL and Amazon. Since 2021, the league has relied on Amazon Web Services’ cloud-based content delivery system to deliver some of its video content and analytics tools, including NHL Edge. The NHL’s first collaboration with Prime Video, “All or Nothing: Toronto Maple Leafs,” also premiered in 2021, and more productions have followed.

This fall, Prime Video will enter the live game broadcasting market, taking over Canada's national Monday night hockey broadcasts from rights holder Rogers Sportsnet. The broadcast team will be led by live commentator John Forslund and spearheaded by Hall of Fame player Mark Messier.

On Thursday nights, Andi Petrillo will also host a rotating cast of analysts for a wrap-up show called “NHL Coast to Coast,” covering up to 10 games each week from puck drop to final whistle, in a format similar to “NFL RedZone.”

“NHL Coast to Coast” premieres on Thursday, October 10, two days after the official start of the regular season in North America. “Monday Night Hockey” kicks off on October 14 at the Bell Centre when the Montreal Canadiens host Sidney Crosby and the Pittsburgh Penguins.