Psst, new Olympic ice hockey fans: The NHL is like this all the time

Don’t let Team USA’s dramatic win over Canada in the Olympic women’s ice hockey gold medal game be the beginning and end of your hockey fandom.

If Twitter represents an accurate cross-section of North American society — and, for better or worse, we can probably assume that it does — most of the continent tuned in late Wednesday night as Team USA’s women’s ice hockey team took on powerhouse Canada in the gold medal game.

Surely, some of those viewers were die-hard hockey fans who knew all about Hillary Knight and Jocelyne Lamoureux and Maddie Rooney and tune into the NHL regularly.

But some of the viewers who found themselves staying up into the wee hours of the morning Thursday to watch ice hockey might only do this every four years, or maybe every June when the Stanley Cup playoffs get into full swing.

And they’re missing out.

Certainly, it’s no surprise that Canadians turned out in full force to watch the match; this is their lifeblood. But the Americans got so hyped on Olympic ice hockey that they broke ratings records:

In case you don’t speak ratings, know this: In the 2016-17 NHL regular season, NBCSN broadcast 91 games and averaged 336,000 viewers. That was the league’s lowest cable TV average since the 2011–12 season, per SI.com’s Richard Deitsch, via Sports Business Daily.

When the NHL’s Pittsburgh Penguins and St. Louis Blues faced off in an afternoon game leading in to NBC’s Winter Olympics coverage on Sunday, Feb. 11, it scored a 1.2 rating and 1.89 million viewers. That was NBC’s best-rated NHL regular-season game since 2014.

So, yeah; early Thursday morning, a lot of people watched hockey — at 2:00 a.m. eastern time, outside of primetime.

Where are all those people during the 82 games of the NHL regular season?

It’s no secret that the NHL is the oft-ignored middle child of professional sports broadcasts in America. But if you liked feeling your blood pressure rise and your pulse quicken during the U.S. women’s 3-2 victory over Canada last night, good news: the NHL can deliver that feeling to you at least once a week for nine months out of the year.

Sure, the stakes aren’t always this high. Team USA versus Team Canada was a true David and Goliath matchup this year:

But if you want to keep riding this high (and getting a little more sleep to boot), the NHL is here for you, putting a fantastic product on the ice week in and week out, just waiting to be watched.

Not convinced? Start out with the Stanley Cup playoffs this spring, which deliver the drama in every single round, and then work in a couple regular-season games each week thereafter.

Forget about the cognitive dissonance between watching a game played in a refrigerated stadium in June. In the NHL playoffs, unlike any other of the four major sports, every single goal matters and can mean the end of a season or a chance to hoist the Stanley Cup.

One. Goal.

Also — hate that the Olympic gold medal game ended in a shootout? There’s none of that in the Stanley Cup playoffs. In the NHL, playoff overtime periods are 20 minutes and go down pretty much exactly like in regulation, except for the golden goal, which is basically sudden death.

Don’t get it twisted: the Olympics exist on a different plane than the rest of sports, and they’ll always hold a special place in the hearts (and viewing schedules) of sports fans around the world. That’s especially true for women’s hockey.

But if you liked what you saw last night, the NHL is here for you. Embrace it. Support it. Watch it.

Next: Best Olympian from each state

For more from the Winter Olympics, make sure to follow FanSided and stay tuned to our Olympics hub for all the latest news and results. Follow the Olympics medal count here.