CBC is fuelling Canada’s playoff hockey buzz with a national media campaign and a refreshed Hockey channel for its website.

The post-season site now sports a new online-only pre-game show, Hockey Night Online, and live streaming of every game and Coach’s Corner. The broadcaster also refreshed its Hockey Night in Canada iPhone and iPad apps.

New ad opps on the site include pushdown ad units, wallpapers and site takeovers, as well as content branding opportunities, social media integrations and mobile. The Home Depot is the presenting sponsor of the playoff site.

CBCSports.ca receives an average of 1.3 million visitors per month, according to ComScore.

CBC’s playoff push is being supported with a large-scale national media campaign called, appropriately, ‘It doesn’t get any bigger than this.’ Spots are running across CBC’s broadcast properties, including the main network, news channel, Bold and Documentary, as well as OOH and radio.

The national OOH effort includes billboards on the Gardiner Expressway and Yonge Street in Toronto; wild postings in Toronto and Vancouver (featuring four separate posters displaying four stages of ‘playoff beard’ growth); night projections with video and audio on the sides of buildings in Vancouver and Montreal; and over 500 digital screens in sporting venues, bars, restaurants and beer stores in Toronto and Vancouver.

Print ads started yesterday in the Toronto Star, Vancouver Province, National Post and Globe and Mail, and an online buy across major Canadian portals is underway as well.

CBC has also launched a Facebook app that lets fans ‘beard themselves’ with six playoff beard styles that they can add to their profile pictures. The wild postings all drive to the Facebook page, and an online spot (below) is running on the page as well.