Chicago will take on Dallas in an alternate, real-time format on TV Saturday afternoon with play-by-play man Chris Vosters calling the action.
The last-place Chicago Blackhawks really will become a cartoon when they host the surging, Central Division leading Dallas Stats at 2:30 p.m. on Saturday, March 6.
Seriously. And we know in advance.
Fans will be able to view the game in a first-ever real-time animated telecast. The alternate presentation will start at 2 p.m. CT on NBC Sports Chicago plus with a special edition of Blackhawks Pregame Live. See a sample in the video.
Fans will see the game with a representation of all its real action and players as part of a celebration of a "birthday party" for Chicago team mascot Tommy Hawk. Blackhawks TV play-by-play broadcaster Chris Vosters will call the game, but he'll be working off monitors in the NHL offices in New York. There will be about a 40-second delay as the game is converted into a volumetric animated format.
The kids-friendly broadcast will leverage NHL EDGE positional data and optical tracking to recreate action on the ice.
Vosters, who has gone through a rehearsal for the broadcast, will be joined by analysts Dominic Moore, Tony Granato and Adam Burish–once kidded by teammates the "the most interviewed fourth-line forward in hockey."
The broadcast is a complement to, but not a replacement for, a traditional game telecast on NBS Sports Chicago with broadcasters John Wiedeman and Darren Pang. The goal is to engage younger fans.
"Every day, we're challenging ourselves to bring hockey to fans in new ways, and we're incredibly excited to bring the first-ever local animated game to kids across Chicagoland and beyond in partnership with NBC Sports Chicago and the NHL," Jaime Faulkner, Blackhawks president of business operations said in a statement."