It was not much of a game, but Alabama’s latest destruction of Mississippi still did well for ESPN.
Last Saturday’s Alabama-Mississippi college football game drew a 2.3 rating and 4.11 million viewers on ESPN, up 53% in ratings and 64% in viewership from last year (LSU-Mississippi State: 1.5, 2.50M) and up 92% and 97% respectively from 2016 (Texas A&M-Auburn: 1.2. 2.09M).
Compared to last year’s matchup between the teams, which aired on ESPN in week five of the season, ratings increased 28% (from 1.8) and viewership 36% (from 3.03M). Alabama won by 55 this year and by 63 last year. In 2016, when the Tide narrowly avoided an upset at the hands of Mississippi, the matchup had a 5.0 and 8.17 million on CBS.
Despite the lopsided margin, Saturday’s game ranked third among college football games last weekend behind the competing Ohio State-TCU game on ABC (4.2, 7.3M) and LSU-Auburn on CBS earlier in the day (3.5, 5.9M).
In other ESPN action, Washington-Utah scored a 1.0 and 1.59 million late Saturday night — up 25% in ratings and 33% in viewership from last year (Mississippi-Cal: 0.8, 1.20M) but down a third and 35% respectively from 2016 (Texas-Cal: 1.5, 2.45M).
Shifting to the afternoon, FSU’s blowout loss to Syracuse drew a 1.2 (+20%) and 1.87 million (+19%) and Boise State-Oklahoma State drew a 0.85 (-24%) and 1.44 million (-19%).
ESPN’s College Gameday started the day off with 1.56 million viewers (-10%).
As for the other ESPN networks, ESPN2 topped out at a 0.28 and 461,000 (+61%) for Miami-Toledo. It trailed ESPNU in the same window, which scored 554,000 for the rescheduled Georgia Southern-Clemson game (+184%), and was not much ahead of ESPNEWS, which aired the rescheduled Middle Tennessee-Georgia game (440K).
The full list of week three college football ratings is available here.
[Numbers from ESPN PR 9.18, Nielsen via ShowBuzz Daily 9.18]
