Thomas Hickey to be MSG Networks' main Islanders analyst
Thomas Hickey during the New York Islanders Draft Party at UBS Arena last June. Credit: Howard Simmons
Thomas Hickey will work the majority of Islanders games this season as an analyst on MSG Sportsnet alongside play-by-play man Brendan Burke, a source familiar with the plan told Newsday on Friday.
But Butch Goring, MSG Networks’ lead Islanders analyst since 2010-11, will remain heavily involved in the coverage, working some games as the lone analyst, some in a three-man booth with Hickey and Burke and some in the studio.
Hickey, 36, joined the Islanders’ television team as a studio analyst in 2022-23, the season after he retired as an Islanders defenseman, and is seen as a rising star in the business. He also works on Prime Video’s Monday night NHL games in Canada.
Goring, 75, was a member of the Islanders’ four Stanley Cup-winning teams and coached the team from 1999-2001. The Islanders retired his No. 91 in 2020.
Cal Clutterbuck, who played for the Islanders through 2023-24 and joined MSG’s studio team last season, will have an expanded studio role this season.
The regular season opens Oct. 9 at Pittsburgh. MSG Networks will carry 72 of the Islanders’ 82 games.
Rangers radio update
MSG Networks announced that Dave Starman, a former college goaltender and a familiar figure at various levels of hockey on Long Island, will serve as the Rangers’ lead radio analyst with play-by-play man Alex Faust on ESPN New York radio. They will replace the former radio team of Kenny Albert and Dave Maloney, who now will call games on television.
Neil Best first worked at Newsday in 1982, returned in 1985 after a detour to Alaska and has been here since, specializing in high schools, college basketball, the NFL and most recently sports media and business.
