The Senior Bowl scored its smallest audience in several years. In other news, Brent Musburger‘s final game delivered a big increase in the ratings, and the NHL returned from its All-Star break with a decline on NBCSN.
Senior Bowl Least-Watched in Years
- College football’s Senior Bowl scored 613,000 viewers on NFL Network Saturday afternoon, down 19% from last year (758K), down 8% from 2015 (668K), and the smallest audience for the game since at least 2010. The 0.4 final rating was down a tick from both last year and 2015 (0.5). Despite the lower numbers, the Senior Bowl maintained its status as the most-watched college football All-Star game, routing the East-West Shrine Game (381K) and the Collegiate Bowl (178K), which aired opposite each other the previous weekend.
UGA/UK Up Big on ESPN
- Georgia/Kentucky drew a 1.1 final rating and 1.6 million viewers on ESPN’s Super Tuesday this week, up 57% in ratings and 56% in viewership from Indiana/Michigan last year (0.7, 1.0M) and up 120% and 166% respectively from Florida/Vanderbilt in 2015 (0.5, 610K). The Wildcats’ overtime win was also Brent Musburger‘s final broadcasting assignment. Earlier, Maryland/Ohio State had a 0.6 and 889,000 (-39%). In other action, Duke/Notre Dame had 1.7 million (+6%) and Oklahoma State/Oklahoma 905,000 (-5%) on ESPN’s Big Monday, while Kansas/Baylor scored a 0.8 and 1.3 million on ESPN2 Wednesday — the latter network’s top college hoops audience since Kentucky/Louisville in December 2014.
Double-Digit Drop For NHL on NBCSN Wednesday
- Bruins/Capitals earned 441,000 viewers on the latest edition of NHL Wednesday Night Rivalry on NBSCN, down 19% from Flyers/Capitals last year (543K) and down 13% from Penguins/Capitals in 2015 (505K). Ratings were not immediately available. Going back to All-Star weekend, the NHL SuperSkills Competition delivered a 0.4 final rating (-20%) and 781,000 viewers (-10%) — marking the smallest audience for the event since 2008 (665K).
(Numbers via ShowBuzz Daily 1.31, Programming Insider 2.1, 2.2, ShowBuzz Daily 1.30)
