NHL games were moved from ESPN to the little-known venture owned by Comcast, and critics snickered; it was the equivalent of broadcasting games from your parents' basement.

OLN has changed its name to Versus and the network has improved and expanded by leaps and bounds.

Jamie Davis, who was hired as president last April and started in September, said the anonymity of the network has been addressed.

"When I came to Versus, I was quite fortunate because the network was really growing," said Davis. "One of the things I needed to do was to evaluate what was working and what wasn't. We only did the rebrand from OLN to Versus in September of 2006. Shortly after that, we did a brand awareness survey in December of 2006 and the brand was, frankly speaking, not very well known. It was about 16 percent among total sports viewers. We did a resurvey over the summer and we're now at 59 percent. That's great and huge momentum in less than two years."

One of Davis's goals was converting the venture from its hunting and fishing roots to a more mainstream sports destination.

"We signed the Indy Car Racing [to a 10-year deal], which used to be on ESPN," he said. "We have our first race coming up in April. We made it a priority to start building up our original programming. One of the things we did in October was we launched a show called 'Sports Soup.' "

"Sports Soup," the sports equivalent of E Entertainment's "Talk Soup," airs Tuesdays and Thursdays at 10 p.m. Davis said Versus's long-term plan is to launch 2-3 more original shows this year and add shows in 2010.

He promises that none will be people sitting at a desk discussing statistics and showing highlights.

Another goal is to build up the network's digital media. When Davis arrived, he said the digital media consisted of the website, which was primarily a marketing tool.

"It had our TV listings and information on our shows, but really, it was not that compelling of content, so we brought in Neal Scarbrough [former editor of ESPN.com] to revamp our entire digital media strategy, which will be relaunching again in 2009," said Davis. "It's not going to be just highlights, stats, and data. What we're about is trying to find sports that have a passionate sports base and find a way to super-serve them."

The debate has long raged about the modern-day merits of All-Star games. Davis believes the NHL All-Star Game is every bit as relevant as it has always been. Versus airs the festivities in Montreal this weekend with the SuperSkills and YoungStars Game at 7 p.m. tomorrow and the All-Star Game at 6 p.m. Sunday.

"The ratings for hockey have been absolutely fantastic for us," he said. "Last year, hockey had a stellar year on our network. In the key demographic of men 18-34, the Stanley Cup finals were up 357 percent. So far, in the regular season alone, we've been able to [build off that]."

Davis said the Winter Classic on New Year's Day at Wrigley Field between the Red Wings and Blackhawks fueled interest in the sport.

"That has given us a huge tidal wave of momentum coming into the All-Star Game," he said. "We're very, very excited. We're making this weekend more than just an All-Star Game. We're making it a whole All-Star weekend."

After the game, the network will air a special edition of "Sports Soup," followed by a World Extreme Cagefighting rematch between Urijah Faber and Jens Pulver at 9 p.m.

"The [last] fight was on June 1," said Davis. "It was a 1.4 rating and it's gone down as one of the best fights ever in MMA in any weight class. We're making it into a huge blockbuster night and I think we're going to see record ratings for our network."