Ferraro’s 23rd season as an analyst and fifth with ESPN began with the second game of an opening night tripleheader at Madison Square Garden on Oct. 7. He played 18 seasons in the League as a forward and at 61-years-old, the passion for his second career is aging like the finest of spirits. He also covers the Vancouver Canucks for Sportsnet, and this season joined FanDuel Sports Network as a rotating Kings analyst.
“I love going to the rink,” Ferraro said. “I love the games. I love the position I’m in, between the benches, where I really feel like I’m somewhat connected to the game. Everybody prepares their games a little bit differently and for me, this is unbelievably Year 23 of doing this, so I’m pretty comfortable in the way that I prep now.”
Tuesday will be the third year of “Frozen Frenzy,” this one coming nearly 41 years after Ferraro made his NHL debut with the Hartford Whalers, a 6-5 win against the Boston Bruins at Hartford Civic Center on Dec. 19, 1984, part of a hockey life that took the native of Trail, British Columbia, into the B.C. Sports Hall of Fame with the Class of 2025 on Oct. 21.
Ferraro spoke with NHL.com about what happens behind the scenes, the Olympic Winter Games Milano Cortina 2026, a few storylines he’s watching, and calling two games in two different cities on the same night to start last season.
How do you handle a busier schedule after committing to select Kings telecasts?
“Well, really, nothing changes. As (analyst) Jimmy Fox lowers his workload a little bit, they were looking to cover 10 to 12 to 15 games, somewhere in there, so myself and my brother-in law, Tony Granato, are going to do some games. Luc Robitaille is [Kings] president, and Mike Altieri is (senior vice president, communications and broadcast). They’re longtime friends. I played with Luc and worked with Mike, and they asked if I would do some games. It’s a place I’m quite fond of, so the extra games really are not very much. They certainly won’t change any prep.”
Storylines featuring players, coaches and trends help promote every game. How important is it to learn what goes into a broadcast?
“What I hope is that I’m able to give a little bit of background, insight or experience — I’ve been around the NHL for 40 years — of what happened and there’s a reason why it happened. I find the games fun. If there’s something funny in the game, I often think of, if I were watching at home, would I find that funny? And then we show that too, because it’s sport. Once it gets down into the final couple of series, everything just gets so intense and so dialed-in, and those games are a challenge to get that right. We do our best at it and to me, that’s part of the challenge. Part of the reason I like doing games so much is you can prepare all day long, and when the puck hits the ice, so much of what I do is on the spot. It’s instinct. It’s working with the truck with the producer in the tape room. We’re doing everything on the fly. I don’t think people quite understand when the whistle blows, the people in the tape room are putting a highlight together in the two or three seconds that I’ve got to set it up. That highlight has got to be there because when I finish talking, it’s a face-off. Football will have a pretty set time for highlights between plays, more of a structured setup. Hockey is like by the seat of your pants most of the time.”
The 2026 Olympics is the first tournament with NHL players since the 2014 Sochi Olympics. The 4 Nations Face-Off proved how much international competition means to players, coaches and fans. What will separate the 2026 Games from other events?
“You’ve got all this gap of time, and many great players have never played in the Olympics. I think we saw a bit of what it will look like in the 4 Nations last year, the intensity, the pride. I was lucky enough to play for Canada three times at the (IIHF) World Championship (1989, ’92 and ’96) and when you pull that jersey on with your country’s flag on the front, it’s just different. You’re just filled with pride. Maybe that’s obvious, but it just feels different, so why will the Olympics be better than the 4 Nations? Because there’s more teams involved. It won’t be so quick. There will be strategy as teams are trying to work their way through the tournament. There’s health. There’s the way that the team comes together. Oftentimes, the best teams sort of create themselves during a tournament. It’s that stuff that I love and that I will be looking forward to watching.”
Matthew Schaefer and the New York Islanders visit the Carolina Hurricanes on Thursday (7:30 p.m. ET; HULU, ESPN+). You played five seasons for the Islanders (1990-95). Do you ever recall the amount of energy and excitement from the organization and fan base over any player, let alone the No. 1 pick in the 2025 NHL Draft?
“I’d say Edmonton was pretty excited about Connor McDavid and Pittsburgh was pretty excited about Sidney Crosby, so we can have a little bit of recency bias. You kind of forget there’s been some really amazing players that changed the fortunes of franchises and fans couldn’t wait to watch them play. The Islanders have been looking for some good news for a while, and certainly since John Tavares left (in 2018). They’ve had some really good seasons, but they’ve been seasons I think that have kind of gone under the radar because their style of play was not open, was not free. It was a really a grind-it-out, physical-type style play that suited them very well. I watched three clips of (Schaefer) skating and I’m like, ‘Oh my gosh, it’s like he’s glued to the ice.’ Just a beautiful skater. The enthusiasm around his game sometimes makes it unfair for an 18-year-old kid to come in and you expect … it’s not basketball. He can’t turn a team sport by himself but given the three picks they got in the first round this year, Schaefer as the headline, Victor Eklund and Kashawn Aitcheson, there is real good news on the way on the Island. As an alum, I had my best moments there, I’m happy for them.”