If Monday night’s Versus telecast of the Rangers-Red Wings game looked and sounded a lot like an NHL on NBC telecast — with Pierre McGuire “inside the glass” at rinkside along with Mike Emrick and Ed Olczyk in the booth — that’s no coincidence.

When the $30 billion joint venture transaction between Comcast and General Electric was finalized on Jan. 28, Versus programming came under control of the newly reorganized NBC Sports Group. Its head, Dick Ebersol, has made massive changes at Versus. Not only is this likely to improve the quality of its NHL telecasts, it demonstrates to the NHL how good its national cable package will be if the league renews its NBC and Versus deals.

There has been much speculation about where the NHL’s U.S. TV rights are headed, but one source who is familiar with the negotiations says talks are continuing on a long-term deal that would keep the league’s games on NBC and Versus for anywhere between four and seven years.

While there have been reports that a bidding war is developing over the NHL’s rights on both broadcast and cable, there are indications that NBC and Versus will hold onto the packages, although the rights fees will be steeper. Within the TV industry, the thinking is that NBC’s retaining the rights to the NHL is crucial, not just to its effort to upgrade Versus, but also for the prestige of NBCUniversal’s new corporate structure and the new NBC Sports Group, as the NHL contract is their first deal to be negotiated. The source added that ESPN is unlikely to win any part of the national cable package.

In addition, the source said, Flyers owner Ed Snider “won’t let the NHL leave” Versus and NBC. “And I’d be very surprised if he would devalue the brand by letting ESPN have even a secondary national cable package.” In addition to his position as a powerful NHL team owner and member of the league’s Board of Governors Executive Committee, Snider is American Chairman of Comcast Spectacor.

Another factor to be considered in favor of NBC-Versus is that Jon Litner, who was until 2005 the NHL’s chief operating officer and most recently in charge of Comcast’s regional sports networks, has just been named the president of Versus. An NHL-friendly environment for the national cable package is certainly a plus.

After spurning the NHL, ESPN has made noises about winning back the NHL’s cable package, and a segment of NHL types, fans and sports industry analysts have championed a return by the NHL as a solution to the league’s problems in parts of the U.S., despite the fact that ESPN regularly marginalized both the league and the sport, especially after it added the NBA to its programming inventory. Relegated almost entirely to ESPN 2, NHL programming was also trimmed when that channel cut back and then canceled its “NHL 2night” wrap-around show.

Hockey coverage on ESPN’s SportsCenter has always been spotty at best and did not improve when The Worldwide Leader held the NHL rights. The league departed from Disney after the 2003-04 season when ESPN said it only wanted to retain the NHL if the rights fees were reduced to no more than $30 million per year. The current NBC and Versus contracts were separately negotiated with different entities: NHL-Versus was a straight rights fee agreement worth around $75 million annually; the NHL-NBC deal was a revenue sharing agreement in which no upfront fee was paid, but the league and network split revenues after production and related costs were subtracted.

although the rights fees will be steeper

Ference spoke the truth and now he’s in trouble. He came right out and said that teammate Daniel Paille put a “bad hit’’ to the head of Dallas’s Raymond Sawada last Thursday night. Rather than blindly defend his teammate, when the whole world could see Paille was wrong, Ference said, “You can’t be hypocritical about it when it happens to you, then say it’s fine when your teammate does it. It’s a hit they’re trying to get rid of.’’

Wham. Ference violated one of those sacred tenets of sports: never go against your teammate. Always back your own guy, no matter how wrong or stupid he might be. If Pedro Martinez cowardly throws at the head of Karim Garcia because Pedro is getting his butt kicked by the Yankees, you are not allowed to say that Pedro was wrong for head-hunting. You are supposed to dummy up and play the obtuse game. You are supposed to say that probably the pitch just got away.

The Bruins have a couple of players who’ve been seriously impacted by concussions. Patrice Bergeron was hammered by Randy Jones in October 2007 and did not play again that season. Marc Savard was cheap-shotted to the head by Matt Cooke last March, suffered another concussion last month, and yesterday told us he is done for the season. Savard looked and sounded very much like a man who might retire.

So one would think there would be applause when Ference speaks out against a blind-side hit to the head (by Paille) that could have had the same impact.

No. You can’t say it about a teammate. Many athletes will tell you that if you played the game, you would know this.

“Keep it to yourself, Andrew Ference,’’ former Bruin (player and coach) Mike Milbury said on CBC’s “Hockey Night in Canada.’’ “You can’t do it. You just can’t do it. It’s unacceptable.’’

Former Bruins coach Don Cherry was more emphatic on CBC: “I don’t care if your teammate is an ax murderer. What you’ve got to say to the guy, you tell him in the dressing room. You never go to the press like Ference did and say that was a bad hit. The kid’s going to lose $23,000 over that [Paille was fined and suspended for four games]. They don’t need a guy like Ference.’’

Maybe I missed it, but I don’t remember Bill Guerin taking this kind of heat when he ripped teammate Cooke for cracking Savard.

The league's top-ranked unit went 0-for-9 in the past two games, contributing to two tough losses. But after the Blackhawks' 3-1 loss Monday to the Calgary Flames at the Saddledome, an upset Keith offered another reason for the team's troubles.

"[Expletive] the power play," Keith said after the game. "Nobody goes to the net to score goals. That's why we don't win."