CTV's limited access to Canadian-based teams (other than Québec, whose English-speaking fan base was quite small) translated into poor ratings.
The problems arguably peaked when the Montréal-Québec second-round playoff series opened without Molson being allowed to broadcast from Quebec City, leaving Games 3 and 4 off of English-language television altogether.
This led to a hastily-arranged syndicated package on a chain of stations[15][16] that would one day form the basis of the Global Television Network.
The deal between Carling O'Keefe and the Canwest/Global consortium (with a few CBC and CTV affiliates sprinkled in for good measure) came just in time for Game 6 of this series on April 30.
During the 1980s, Global consisted of a single station in Toronto with numerous rebroadcast transmitters throughout Ontario, CanWest was a chain of independent stations in Western Canada (and at the time a part-owner of Global), and the two often combined to carry syndicated programming, such as this NHL package and the Canadian Football Network, which would also begin in 1987.