Not to wave the hometown flag too much, but Chicago Blackhawks fans aren’t the only people upset that they trail 2-0 in their playoff series with St. Louis. NBC also is a bit anxious.

In all sports, the networks always root for the team that delivers the most viewers. That’s the Blackhawks in the NHL.

Not only do the Blackhawks have a big national following as an Original 6 team, their local numbers in the nation’s third largest market usually make up a significant portion of NBC’s overall rating.

Saturday’s game 2 did a 1.6 rating on NBC, up 33 percent from the game that aired in that window in 2013. The game did a 9.5 rating in Chicago, which means it was seen in an estimated 332,500 households.

St. Louis actually had a higher local rating at 11.2. However, since St. Louis is the nation’s 21st highest market for Nielsen, that means the game was seen in an estimated 134,000 homes in that area, roughly 60 percent less than the viewership level in Chicago.

Just do the math, and it is easy to see why NBC is pulling for the Blackhawks to turn things around, beginning with Game 3 tonight.

Chicago power, with some considerable help from Boston, helped NBC and NBCSN average 5.76 million viewers per game in 2013, making it the most-watched Stanley Cup Final on record. Game 6 pulled in 8.16 million viewers, with nearly a million homes watching in Chicago.

NBC is realistic. The networks knows it isn’t going to have Chicago go deep in the playoffs every year.

However, no offense to St. Louis, but NBC would at least like to see the Blackhawks make the conference finals, if that’s not too much to ask.