(Photo Credit: SinBin.vegas Photographer Brandon Andreasen)

2019 marked the first time in the history of the NHL that a playoff game was played following the elimination of the Vegas Golden Knights.

(It almost makes it sound cool that the Golden Knights were eliminated. No? Oh well, I tried.)

Conventional wisdom would say that once Vegas’ team was gone from the playoffs, especially with the way it happened, that the market would shut their TV’s off from the rest of the postseason. However, the proved to be far from the case.

Las Vegas ranked 9th in the country for the top markets across the entire Stanley Cup Final drawing a 4.4 rating (meaning 4.4% of Vegas households were watched the games).

Top 10 Markets across the Stanley Cup Final on NBC/NBCSN

1. St. Louis 28.7
2. Boston 25.5
3. Providence 19.2
4. Buffalo 9.5
5. Kansas City 5.6
6. Pittsburgh 5.3
7. Hartford 5.2
8. Ft. Myers 4.5
9. Las Vegas 4.4
10. Denver 4.3

Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Final came in as the most watched non-Golden Knights game in city history, pulling in a 7.6 rating, also ranked 9th in the United States.

As for Golden Knights games, the ratings were incredibly impressive once again, blowing all other competing shows out of the water.

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These two things are kind of a big reason for the massive bump in ratings. (Photo Credit: SinBin.vegas Photographer Brandon Andreasen)

It’s no secret to anyone that the Vegas Golden Knights are the most popular item in Las Vegas right now. Show up to a game, there are routinely 18,000+ people wearing grey and gold. Drive down the street and you’ll see thousands of VGK decals, stickers, plate holders, and now even custom license plates. You can go pretty much anywhere in this city and you are almost guaranteed to see the Golden Knights logo somewhere or on someone.

But the best determinant of actual fandom is eyeballs. By that I mean, people watching the games on TV.

Last year the numbers were very hard to come by (believe me, we asked over 20 times over the course of the season), but as the regular season came to a close, Sports Business Journal was able to gather the average number from the season.

The Vegas Golden Knights had a 1.87 rating on AT&T Rocky Mountain in the team’s inaugural season. –John Ourand and Ian Thomas, SportsBusiness Journal

For context, the league leader was the Pittsburgh Penguins with a 5.81 rating, the Buffalo Sabres came in second at 4.62 and the St. Louis Blues pulled a 3.93. The worst ratings in the league were by the Anaheim Ducks (0.24) and the Florida Panthers (0.27).

Before I show you the numbers for this year, let me explain TV ratings quickly. The numbers above, called “ratings” indicate what percentage of total households with televisions (whether turned on or not) are watching the channel. There’s another metric, called “share” which indicates the total percentage of households have that actually have TVs turned on which are tuned to a channel.

So, on to the fun numbers. Here are the Golden Knights ratings per game on AT&T SportsNet this season.

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Anyone who has been anywhere in the Vegas valley over the past four months or so is well aware of the buzz this city has for the Golden Knights, but finally, there are numbers to back up how in love Las Vegas is for its hockey team.

Game 1 delivered an 11.1 local TV rating, the best for any game ever on NBCSN in Las Vegas. It also earned a 19 share, which means 19% of televisions that were turned on in Las Vegas were watching the Golden Knights and Sharks.

And this was a home game, so the 18,400+ at the game couldn’t be watching on TV. (Photo Credit: SinBin.vegas Photographer Brandon Andreasen)

The game drew a 0.65 overnight national rating, up 35% from the first late-night Round Two game in 2017. The game averaged 830,000 viewers with a peak of 1.1 millon, that’s up 47% vs comparable game last year and the best late-night Round Two Game 1 since 2010, excluding Blackhawks games.

All in all, a lot of people all over the country watched the Golden Knights destroy the Sharks, and a ridiculous amount watched from their homes in Las Vegas.

Now, on to tomorrow night, for Game 2, which will be the Golden Knights national TV debut on NBC at 5PM Pacific time. Expect the numbers for that one to be even better than they were in Game 1.