WNBA Finals: After Dud Opener, Game 2 Earns Best Audience in Years

Posted by | 10/18/2012 at 8:39 pm

Getting prime exposure on regular ESPN, the second game of the 2012 WNBA Finals earned the largest audience in nearly a decade.

Game 2 of the Fever/Lynx WNBA Finals drew 778,000 viewers on ESPN Wednesday night, up 74% from Dream/Lynx Game 2 on ESPN2 last year (447K), and up 60% from Dream/Storm Game 2 on ESPN2 in 2010 (487K).

The game peaked with 1.011 million viewers from 9:15-9:30 PM ET.

Wednesday’s game earned the largest audience for any WNBA Finals game since Game 4 of the 2006 Shock/Monarchs series on ESPN2 (793K).

In addition, Game 2 attracted the largest audience for any WNBA playoff game on ESPN — which televises far fewer games than ESPN2 — since Game 3 of the Comets/Sparks Western Conference Finals in 1999 (1.052M).

On Sunday night, Fever/Lynx Game 1 drew a much less impressive 343,000 viewers on ESPN2 — down 30% from last year’s Game 1 on ESPN (491K), and down 24% from Game 1 of the 2010 series on ABC (450K).

CORRECTION 10/25/12: Game 2 was the most-viewed WNBA Finals game since Shock/Monarchs Game 4 in 2006, not Sun/Monarchs Game 3 in 2005.

(Wednesday’s numbers from WNBA.com; Sunday’s numbers from Son of the Bronx)

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  • Kwanfan

    Game 1 probably had more viewers because most folks thought there was no way the Fever were going to beat the Lynx on the Lynx home floor. Game 2 drew more vierers because after the Fever beat the Lynx without 1 of the Fevers star players folks wanted to see what would happen in game 2. The Fever were well on their way to taking game 2 as well until the Lynx coach went ballistic causing the ref’s to call just about every foul on the Fever. The Lynx coach knew her team was in trouble so she created a situation which helped the Lynx but hurt the Fever and just may have shanged the outcome of this series. 

  • Kwanfan

    Furthermore game 1 was not a dud to Fever fans.

  • Andy

    Baseball Rainout