It’s hard to believe the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia are less than a year away. NBCUniversal recently announced that it will begin its primetime coverage of the 2014 Sochi Olympics on Thursday, February 6, 2014, one night before the broadcast network provides its traditional primetime coverage of the Opening Ceremony on Friday, February 7, 2014. This marks the first time any U.S. media company has dedicated primetime coverage to Olympic competition – Winter or Summer -- prior to the Opening Ceremony.
TODAY also recently celebrated the one-year mark by transforming the TODAY Plaza into a winter wonderland complete with Mount Rockefeller, a 14 by 56 foot ski slope. Olympians and Olympic hopefuls joined Matt Lauer, Savannah Guthrie, Al Roker and Natalie Morales on the Plaza to preview the upcoming Winter Games. TODAY anchors also learned the basics of freestyle skiing’s newest Olympic event: slopestyle. Slopestyle skiers showed off the first-time Olympic sport on Mount Rockefeller. Past Olympians Scott Hamilton, Chuck Berkeley and Evan Lysacek participated in the day’s activities as well.
The 2014 Winter Olympics mark the second Olympic Games since Comcast’s acquisition of NBCUniversal. In 2012, Comcast and NBCUniversal brought consumers every minute of every event, on every screen of the London Olympic Games, making the 2012 Olympics the most watched television and live-streaming event in history.