Does the NHL need crowd noise on broadcasts when games return?

The NHL will sound very different in empty arenas if games are allowed to be played this year.

Hockey is inching ever closer to returning later this summer, if the NHL has anything to say about it. Between the announcement of July 10 training camps and that Las Vegas will be the hub city for the Eastern Conference when play resumes, the NHL is gearing up for a return to play push within the next few weeks.

There are a lot of questions still to be answered about the NHL’s return, from how a player gets tested to the league’s plan for if (and more than likely not, when) a player tests positive for coronavirus. One of the major ones in terms of gameplay is if the league and its broadcasters will use fake crowd noise to simulate the typical game day experience for the NHL.

Hockey, and likely most North American sports, will be without fans in the stands for some time, as the upcoming 24-team playoffs will be played in empty arenas when the league returns. Without crowds, a big part of the experience will be missing for fans watching on TV, as well as the players on the ice.

Will the NHL use artificial crowd noise during game broadcasts?

The NHL has a decision to make when it comes to the decision on crowd noise. On the ice, the players are aware of the differences they’ll be seeing — and hearing — when play returns, but will do their best to block out any anomalies from their usual routines.

“It’s going to be a unique set of circumstances,” Toronto Maple Leafs captain John Tavares said in an interview with CBC. “It’s really just being very open-minded and realizing that what you’re accustomed to is going to be very different, to not really let those things bother you and trying to stay focused on what you can control.

“What happens in between the boards is all going to be the same.”

There are options for the NHL to explore if they want to add crowd noise either to the in-arena experience or to the broadcast for fans. The league likely would not want lifeless background crowd noise, as some soccer leagues attempted in the early days of their return to play initiatives.

The league can, however, go the route of Spain’s La Liga and England’s Premier League, which is partnering with EA Sports to supply crowd noise for games based off of the Fifa franchise. Given the league’s track record with EA Sports on the popular NHL franchise of games, it’s an avenue to consider, especially since the games have a large number of crowd samples to pull from.

It certainly won’t be the same as a live crowd, which has spontaneity and direction that an automated crowd noise system would not have. However, it seems like the better option when faced with the absence of crowd noise of any kind, which would mean players are more likely to get picked up on hot mics than ever before.

The NHL may also take pointers from La Liga in another way, which is simulating a fake crowd by superimposing images behind the glass of fans in the stands. The league may have other ways to fake the look of a crowd — if it wants to at all — but there are options for the NHL to take here.

There’s no doubt hockey will look and sound different if play returns later this summer, but there are ways for the sport to get close enough to the real thing to be less of a distraction for fans tuning in on their televisions for the first time in months.

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