It’s a Thursday morning after the Battle of Alberta, Calgary vs Edmonton, one of the biggest rivalries in all of the National Hockey League, but no one is talking about it.

The game wasn’t on Sportsnet Plus, or Sportsnet Pacific or Sportsnet West and it wasn’t blacked out, either. It was on Amazon Prime, another subscription, one more bill for hockey fans to feign participation. Amazon Prime is ten bucks a month. That’s almost the price of a pitcher of beer at Rusty’s Sports Bar in Kelowna but you couldn’t have watched it there, either.

“We didn’t have it because we’re not a streaming bar,” says manager Rae Doyle. “We have to pay for it first.”

Sports bars aren’t immune from the subscription service juggle either, and for all the bellyaching about the rising cost of being a fan, there’s also little sign of changing habits.

Bars are supposed to pay in advance for games rather than a typical consumer subscription model. It’s getting more expensive for them too, while they still have to navigate which channel to use, depending on the day and the game.

Canadian hockey fans, meanwhile, are getting fed up with the rising costs and the handful of subscriptions needed to keep tabs on their favourite teams. Increasingly, they are forgoeing full games, relying on social media highlights and stats instead. Doyle is holding out hope there comes a breaking point and more fans will show up to the pub.

“I’ve been doing this for over 40 years. Things have changed so much, and bars are not the same either, but I would love for sports to bring people back in here,” she said. “It’s going to happen if we get our packages set up properly and they keep putting everything on streams, people will come back.”

The typical Vancouver Canucks fan would have to spend around $370 per year to get access to all the games, accounting for a basic Sportsnet subscription and Amazon Prime. For full access to teams in other broadcast regions, even Edmonton and Calgary, the cost goes up to almost $450.

That’s around $4.30 per game for the Vancouver Canucks’ 84-game season and more than $5 per game for teams outside the region. For around a dollar more, that could be the cost of a drink at your local sports bar.

A recent Angus Reid Institute survey found hockey fans are reluctantly turning away from the game with 80 per cent of respondents weary of the increasing amount of streaming services. Of those who follow NHL closely, 80 per cent also said it’s too expensive to watch their favourite teams.

Doyle said it’s not exclusive to hockey, but specific big games like the Superbowl or the Blue Jays’ final in the MLB World Series can still pull big crowds.

“It’s the atmosphere, it’s what you get out of it. If you want to sit at home or get a few buddies over, that’s different, but you’re never going to get this atmosphere,” she said. “I’m hoping to get a bit of a greyer winter because then people come to watch.”

Fans haven’t turned to their local WHL teams either, according to Kelowna Rockets spokesperson Kohen Dengler.

“Since COVID, attendance has kind of changed. I think this building was pretty full before and then, after COVID, we’ve had to work harder to get people in the building,” he said. “I don’t know if people aren’t going out, they don’t want to spend the money or if the economy is just tough right now, but we want to work to get a full building.”

He said the team has a 3,000-person-strong base of season ticket holders, but the average home game attendance is around 3,500 total. Before the COVID-19 pandemic, it was easier and more common to see the Prospera Place stands filled.

For a single Rockets or Kamloops Blazers home game, tickets are just under $30 while Penticton Vees are a little cheaper. That’s around 10 single tickets for the annual cost of watching your NHL team on TV. To see the Canucks live, a weekday game next month is around $100 for the upper row and almost twice as much for weekend games, like the Oct. 31 match against Toronto Maple Leafs.

“We’ve had a lot of great talent in the last couple years through our building, like Leon Draisaitl, Shea Weber and Duncan Keith,” Dengler said. “It’s an opportunity for you to come see these guys before they’re NHL superstars.”

He added that all WHL season games are streamed online for free.

While the streaming costs for NHL are climbing, those aren’t the only networks needed for sports fans. If you watch CFL, you’ll need TSN. If you watch baseball, Sportsnet will work, but you’ll miss some if you don’t have Apple’s streaming service. NFL fans also need another if they want more than TSN’s regional offering.

Some sports fans not willing to bear the brunt of those costs will still find a way, and the internet offers workarounds.

Lee, a hockey fan who spoke with iNFOnews.ca, laughed off the idea of paying for multiple streaming services, but he still watches NHL and not at a local pub. Instead, he suggested using IPTV, a web-based service often used to pirate broadcasts. He pays $70 per year.

“Less than one of those other apps, and I get all the games I want,” he said.

The Angus Reid Institute poll did not ask respondents about what solutions they have used to beat the rising prices and avoid having numerous subscriptions. It did find just 20% of fans were planning to tune in for PWHL on CBC broadcasts instead.