The biggest story heading into the 2017 Winter Classic has nothing to do with the St. Louis Blues, the Chicago Blackhawks or any stats or strategies used by the teams in an outdoor game. The big story, which is also the primary concern, is in regards to the weather forecast which is currently calling for wet and mild conditions which may impact when the game is actually played.
Jeremy Rutherford reports that though the league will do everything it can to have the game start on time, there’s the very real possibility the game will be played Monday night or even on Tuesday night.
“We’ve dealt with it before, so we’ll deal with it again if we have to,” said Jon Miller, president of programming for NBC Sports. “If we do run into rain we will stay as long as we can. We’ll play it Monday night if necessary. And if we can’t get any play in on Monday, we’ll carry it over and we’ll play it on Tuesday. We’re hopeful that everything cooperates. We’ve all been looking at the weather, we’re all well aware of what the pitfalls are.”
The league hopes to have a firm idea of what it’s doing at least 24 hours before the start of the game. Advanced notice is only fair for all of the fans traveling to St. Louis for the game.
The Winter Classic should be a great event, but it could feature a lengthy delay – if not a postponement – before it actually takes place.
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