NBC Sports California’s Amaury Pi Gonzalez (left and author) on color and Carlos Ramirez (right) on play by play, call the Anaheim Mighty Ducks and San Jose Sharks NHL game on Sat Oct 12, 2024, on Los Tiburones Night at SAP Center in San Jose (photo provided by Amaury Pi Gonzalez)
Los Tiburones — Successful Hispanic Night at SAP in San José
That’s Amaury News and Commentary
By Amaury Pi-González
On Saturday, October 12, the Sharks celebrated Hispanic Night at the SAP Arena. A capacity crowd of 17,916 joined the fiesta with 100X100 Hispanic flavor, including a live Mariachi band, Balet Folklórico Mexicano.
Los Tiburones played their California rivals, the Anaheim Ducks. It was a very entertaining night, which ended with a 2-0 win for the visiting Ducks.
The action was broadcast live on NBC Sports California, with all the action in Spanish on the Secondary Audio Channel, as well as on Sharks Audio, with Carlos Ramírez handling all the play-by-play and Amaury Pi-González providing commentary and promotional announcements for the whole 2024-25 Sharks season.
Sergio Almodovar, coordinator for the Sharks Media Relations, joined us after the second half ended with insightful information about the 2024-25 Sharks season; he talked about how important the Hispanic community is for the San José Sharks.
Almodovar, born and raised in the Bay Area, is of Mexican heritage. San José is over 30% Hispanic and a community that keeps growing. Some of the most famous Spanish media in the Bay Area are in San José, including KSTS CH 48 Telemundo Network, and some of the highest audiences in Spanish on radio stations in the Bay Area’s largest city.
San José is California’s third most populous city, #1 Los Angeles, #2 San Diego. The largest city in Northern California is a global hub for the high-tech industry, home of world-famous Silicon Valley—hosts annual conferences like Facebook F8 and the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference.
Spanish is the State of California’s unofficial second language. With a total population of around 40 million, there are nearly 20 million Hispanics. Here in the nine=-county Bay Area, 20% of the population is Hispanic/Latino, by far the largest minority in the State and in the Bay Area.
As of July 1, 2023, the Hispanic population in the United States was 65.2 million. The United States of America is #2 with the most significant number of Spanish speakers. México is number one, with 128 million people who speak Spanish.
The Florida Panthers, Chicago Blackhawks, and Vegas Knights have all added Spanish-language broadcasts to serve their Hispanic fan bases.
As Sports Anchor of Telemundo CH 48 San José in 1991-92, I covered the Sharks, even before they built the SAP Center. Covered their first game at the Cow Palace in Daly City (before moving to San José to their current digs).
It was on October 5, 1991, against the Vancouver Canucks, during that 1991-92 season, their first they played at the Cow Palace before moving to the SAP Center in San José in 1993.
In 2016, they covered the first Stanley Cup for the team as they played the Pittsburgh Penguins and lost the series in seven games.
The San José Sharks partnership with the Hispanic/Latino community is more important today than ever.
The Sharks are now a Bay Area institution for the last 33 years. And we all hope their best season are soon to come.
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