3 days Ago By Phil Thompson
If TNT studio director Morgan Thomas had any anxiety about what could go wrong during Tuesday’s NHL Winter Classic at Wrigley Field , she already has seen a curveball or two. The worst already happened during her first Winter Classic on Jan. 1, 2022, when the Minnesota Wild hosted the St.
Louis Blues at Target Field in Minneapolis. “That was probably the most difficult one because the world was coming out of COVID, and so we got a spike in COVID and (the) studio (staff) actually ended up staying home,” said Thomas, who will direct her fourth Winter Classic when the Chicago Blackhawks host the St. Louis Blues on New Year’s Eve at Wrigley.
The crew and on-air talent went to Minneapolis, but the studio team had to stay in Atlanta and Thomas managed it all from home base in Atlanta. “I want to say it was like 18 degrees and the wind chill made it like 6, so I’m not sure it was the worst one to miss from that standpoint, I’m not going to lie,” she recalled. It was even colder than she remembered.
According to NHL records, the game-time temperature was minus-6 — the coldest outdoor game in league history. Given that challenging beginning, it would seem Thomas is pushing her luck by making a weather-related request — of Chicago, of all places. “I really hope it’s snowing.
That’s my first hope,” Thomas said. “There would be a lot of ice cleaning going on for safety reasons, so no one else would agree with me, but from a television perspective it’ll be beautiful. “If you grew up playing pond hockey, you were out there with your friends in the snow, and that’s what we want.
That’s why we play outdoor games. We want that feeling back in the atmosphere.” NHL Winter Classic will use Wrigley Field rooftops and other Chicago Cubs traditions for the New Year’s Eve game Thomas probably realized she might be pushing her luck.
“Now, not rain,” she interjected. “Nobody wants rain. Rain is much worse.
” NHL events president Steve Mayer agrees with Thomas’ fear of rain to some extent. “I mean, if it’s a downpour, yeah, we probably would have to stop the game or you’d have to have a delay,” he said Friday. “But with a steady drizzle like we have today, we can play in that, no problem.
” Steve Mayer, NHL president for content and events, speaks to reporters at Wrigley Field on Friday, Dec. 27, 2024, as the baseball diamond is transformed into a hockey rink for the upcoming NHL Winter Classic between the Blues and Blackhawks. (Terrence Antonio James/Chicago Tribune) Mayer said construction crews installing the rink at Wrigley have had to work around Chicago’s finicky weather, but they planned for any scenario and remain ahead of schedule.
“There is going to be some rain, and rain kind of just slows us down a bit,” he said. “And on game day, it’s actually calling for rain and snow showers.” According to the National Weather Service, Tuesday’s forecast calls for a 50% chance of rain with a high near 41 degrees during the day, with a chance of rain and snow before midnight and a low around 28.
Game time is 4 p.m. “So a nice snowfall wouldn’t be a bad thing that would really add to the Winter Classic ambience,” Mayer said.
Thomas said play-by-play announcer Kenny Albert and color analyst Eddie Olczyk will be rinkside regardless, camera right of center ice. “One of the biggest things that’s changed this year are Kenny and Edzo are going to sit on the glass — rain, sleet, snow or shine,” she said. “They’re so excited.
” Thomas discussed with the Tribune several other new wrinkles for this year’s broadcast, as well as favorite moments from past Winter Classics. Here are seven things we learned. Preparations continue at Wrigley Field on Friday, Dec.
27, 2024, for the NHL Winter Classic between the Blues and Blackhawks. (Terrence Antonio James/Chicago Tribune) “The Blues are going to have to walk down four flights of stairs in their skates in order to go from the locker room to the ice,” Thomas said, “so we put up extra cameras in the hallway.” The players will wear skate guards, of course, but they have to hoof it back up the stairs to the visitors locker room at each intermission.
“This is how we have to get out to the ice,” she said. At least Hawks players get to arrive in style. “Another really cool one is the Chicago Blackhawks are going to arrive on the L,” Thomas said.
They’ll be in street clothes, not their uniforms. According to a source, the Hawks have rented a car on the Red Line and will board at the Fullerton station. They’ll get off at Addison and enter Wrigley through a back alley.
“They’re going to go out on the field and get to take pictures and take in the environment for the first time,” Thomas said, “all while the fans are watching them get to the game the same way that they probably travel to work all the time or to their friend’s house or to the bars or probably even to Wrigley in order to watch the game.” It will sit behind the Blues net. “Every goalie squirt to the face and players slamming up against the glass on that side of the rink is going to be beautiful from this camera,” Thomas said, “because you can’t get a low-end-zone angle in an arena.
“We’re going to be able to bring that in because we’re in a baseball stadium, because we can be on the side of the glass and not have to move seats.” TNT also will use augmented reality graphics during shots of a concert in Gallagher Way and other locations. Preparations continue at Wrigley Field on Friday, Dec.
27, 2024, for the NHL Winter Classic between the Blackhawks and Blues. (Terrence Antonio James/Chicago Tribune) “I think that every year, and then I get there and I’m like, ‘Wow, hockey rinks are really big,’” Thomas said. “They don’t look so big when everybody’s sitting right on the glass and there’s not really space around them.
They look massive when you drop them down on top of a baseball field. The field’s footprint at Wrigley is especially conducive to views from the grandstand, she said. “Wrigley is a little bit skinnier, so the ice is farther out into the field,” she said.
“It does bring it a lot closer to the fans, which I am really excited about. Your fans that would be sitting on the first- or third-base sides are going to be really close to the ice.” “Darren Pang is going to go do a hit from inside the scoreboard at Wrigley,” Thomas said of the Hawks (and former Blues) play-by-play announcer.
“I am not a fan of heights, and I climbed up there to scope this out with him. And it’s just wild. “The inside of this scoreboard that people still climb up there and put the scores out manually and control everything from inside the scoreboard.
I’m like, what a cool tradition when everything is digital now.” Thomas added that while the original painted inning markers won’t be altered, they’ll hang numbers from the scoreboard. “We’re just going to (find) a spot for the hockey score, and then we will hang the score there,” she said.
A view during the third period between the Bruins and Penguins in the 2023 NHL Winter Classic at Fenway Park on Jan. 2, 2023, in Boston. (Gregory Shamus/Getty Images) “Look, I’m not the biggest baseball fan,” Thomas said.
“I am the biggest hockey fan, but being able to go inside of Fenway and do a game?” The Boston Bruins hosted the Pittsburgh Penguins on Jan 2, 2023, the second time Fenway Park hosted a Winter Classic. “(TNT broadcaster Keith Jones) did a hit from inside the Green Monster, and the guys shot hockey pucks at targets off the Green Monster,” Thomas said. She said she and her staff spent a lot of time talking about how they wanted to differentiate the presentation of Wrigley from broadcasts of Cubs games or even the previous Winter Classic at Wrigley on Jan.
1, 2009. “It’s just so much fun to dig into that history and into these differentiating aspects,” she said. “And I very much get that same feel with Wrigley.
” Bruce Bennett/Getty Images Actor Jon Hamm speaks to the media before Game 3 of the 2019 Stanley Cup Final between the Blues and Bruins on June 1, 2019, in St Louis. (Bruce Bennett/Getty Images) Hamm, a die-hard Blues and St. Louis Cardinals fan, showed off the vintage jersey the Blues players will wear when he appeared on “The NHL on TNT.
” He’s confirmed for the Winter Classic, as is former Hawk Chris Chelios. Actor and frequent Wrigley visitor Bill Murray is expected to be there but not confirmed yet. The broadcast also will lean into the New Year’s Eve theme.
“There’s going to be an actual party zone on the field that is going to look like a rooftop that would sit outside of Wrigley that’s going to have fans in it before, during and after the game,” Thomas said. TNT will cut to the partiers helping others around the world ring in the new year as the clock strikes midnight in their corners of the globe. TNT studio director Morgan Thomas.
(Courtesy of TNT) Thomas, 31, was born and raised in Atlanta, “so if I turned on the television, it was for the Thrashers,” she said. “And then there was a mourning period” when the team was sold in 2011 and became the Winnipeg Jets. “Then you do the next-closest thing as a kid, which is Nashville, which has also kind of been a mourning period,” Thomas said, referring to the Predators standing third from last in the Eastern Conference.
“I grew up in the Southeast, rooting for what was around me. Carolina (Hurricanes) came a little late; otherwise, I think I would’ve picked them for my poor beating heart.” So she and her family rooted for the Thrashers for the decade and change they existed, as well as the Auburn Tigers in any sport.
She even attended Auburn. “As I graduated, my husband (Kaleb) actually played hockey and is a huge NHL fan,” Thomas said. “And so he got me into it at a deep X’s and O’s, passion-driven level.
“And he was more excited when TNT Sports got the NHL package (in 2021) than he was when I first started working on ‘Inside the NBA.’ He has just brought so much excitement and understanding for me into hockey ..
. so it’s just grown from there.”.
