When Sports Interaction’s bold, combative campaign “America doesn’t know jack about hockey” was released in October, it was met with one common critique.

While the campaign featured everyday Americans on the street unable to answer interviewer’s questions about hockey, it garnered replies on social media calling Sports Interaction out for only interviewing people in Los Angeles. “Go to Boston or Minny or any Northeast city and try this. Bet you get humbled real quick,” one social media reply stated.

So that’s exactly what the brand did for its latest entry in the campaign, responding to the critique, and quizzing people on the streets of New York about hockey terminology, only to find Americans still didn’t know jack about the sport.

“We’re a brand that wants to poke the bear, so we took that same narrative and said ‘Okay, fine, we’ll go to one of the original six cities,’” says Sports Interaction director of brand content Michael Zitney, referring to the Original Six era of the NHL that included U.S. cities like New York, Boston, Chicago and Detroit.

Zitney says New York was a great choice because the city has a very educated and passionate hockey fanbase. The brand did receive plenty of smart responses, but of course, that’s not what they were looking for.

The “America doesn’t know jack about hockey” campaign followed an earlier campaign that featured NHL legend Chris Pronger and took direct shots at Sports Interaction’s competitors in the sports-betting market. Zitney says the brand isn’t afraid to be punchy as it tries to break through a crowded marketplace. He notes it’s difficult to differentiate between brands, given that there’s so many sports betting companies featured on sports broadcasts.

To set itself apart, Sports Interaction aims to produce bold campaigns that can break through, while also speaking directly to Canadian sports fans, as opposed to its U.S. competition.

“We’re the Canadian brand, we’ve been here for a while, we understand the Canadian sports scene,” Zitney says. “It’s really speaking to that Canadian sports fan on their behalf and talking to them, rather than down to them.”

After this latest iteration of the campaign, Zitney says the brand is playing around with the idea of talking to Canadians and making them look smart about hockey, but ultimately it plans to see where this latest ad goes for making marketing plans timed to NHL playoff season in the spring.

Sports Interaction handled the media buy internally, with Juliet handling creative on the campaign. The 60-second spot began running on Sportsnet this week. Sports Interaction is also the lead sponsor of Hockey Night in Canada.