ESPN scored one of its top NBA preseason ratings on record Tuesday night. In other action, NBCSN posted a dip for NHL action last week, and a small audience watched the premature end of the USMNT’s World Cup run.
ESPN Nears NBA Preseason High
Tuesday’s Bulls-Cavaliers NBA preseason game delivered 1.35 million viewers on ESPN, the most-watched preseason game on the network since Nuggets-Lakers in 2009 (1.42M). Overall, it was the fourth-most watched preseason game since the network acquired NBA rights in 2002, behind Nuggets-Lakers in ’09, Rockets-Heat in 2006 (1.39M) and Kings-Lakers in 2003 (1.9M). Later in the night, Jazz-Lakers had 1.1 million, ranking 16th among ESPN’s preseason games.
NHL Down on NBCSN Last Thursday
NBCSN scored 379,000 viewers for last Thursday’s Wild-Red Wings NHL game, down 24% from Capitals-Penguins last year (500K) but up 41% from Wild-Avalanche in 2015 (268K). The Flyers-Kings nightcap had 212,000. On Tuesday night, Coyotes-Golden Knights had 332,000 and Blackhawks-Canadiens 255,000; the comparable week last year was the opening week of the season.
Small Channels Mean Small Numbers For USMNT Loss
Last night’s Trinidad & Tobago-United States World Cup qualifier, a U.S. loss that eliminated the team from next year’s World Cup, had 463,000 viewers on beIN Sport and 157,000 viewers on NBC’s Universo. By comparison, Friday’s U.S.-Panama match had 1.6 million on the Univision family of networks and 1.2 million on ESPN.
In other action Friday night, Mexico-Trinidad & Tobago earned 2.2 million on the Univision networks and 191,000 on Fox Sports 1. Figures for Tuesday’s Mexico match were not immediately available.
[Wknd. numbers via ShowBuzz Daily 10.6, 10.9, 10.11; Univision 10.10]
