SMT Introduces Upgraded Sensor-Embedded ‘Bright Star’ Puck for NHL Season

SMT, the NHL’s puck and player tracking partner, continues its partnership with the NHL to deliver the most advanced innovations and fan enhancement solutions for the 2022/2023 season.

Products and services from SMT for the NHL include:

• A re-engineered, sensor-embedded puck, dubbed Bright Star. Now with LEDs closer to the puck’s top and bottom layers, the IR light from the puck’s six pipes employ a broader reach to the in-venue optical cameras that power NHL Edge, the puck and player tracking system developed and operated by SMT. NHL Edge also collects data from sensors embedded into jerseys. SMT ingests and distributes the data through its OASIS platform.
• New and more accurate stats this season made available through NHL Edge will include time of possession, zone entry, zone carries, passing success and percentage, and more.
• In-venue video boards will display NHL Edge-integrated metrics such as shot quality, save quality, distance traveled, shot heat maps, and skate speed into SMT-designed L-Bar graphics, providing fans with the same real-time content shown on broadcasts.
• SMT’s SPRITES application may be introduced in more arenas. The companion application offers fans computer-animated streams that depict players moving as digital characters
based off tracking data. SPRITES debuted at watch party for a Stanley Cup Finals game at the Tampa Bay Lightning’s home arena. The broadcast was shown on the arena’s jumbotron while SPRITES was projected onto the ice with shot-trailing animations.
• Since the 2007-08 season, SMT has supplied the NHL’s scoring system called Hockey Information and Tracking System (HITS) scoring system.