Facing other college football games for the first time in 12 years, the Army-Navy game took a hit in the ratings but nonetheless topped the competition.
Saturday’s Army-Navy Game averaged a Nielsen-estimated 4.91 million viewers on CBS, down 36% from last year (7.72M) and the smallest audience for the game since at least 2008. Army’s win marked the first time since 2008 that the annual rivalry game aired opposite other college football games. From 2009-19, it aired unopposed on the weekend after the conference championship games.
Despite the sharp drop and multi-year low, Army-Navy delivered the largest college football audience of the weekend. It topped ABC’s North Carolina-Miami game head-to-head (3.33M) and edged the day’s second-place game, LSU-Florida on ESPN in primetime (4.62M).
For the season, it ranks 12th among college football games. CBS owns five of the top 12, more than any other network.
In other action, the aforementioned LSU-Florida game delivered ESPN’s second-largest college football audience of the season. The 4.62 million viewers for LSU’s upset win trails only Alabama-Mississippi in October (4.89M). Viewership still fell 30% from the rivals’ meeting last season, a top-ten matchup that aired on ESPN in October (6.61M).
ESPN also averaged 2.59 million for Alabama-Arkansas earlier in the day, up 22% from the teams’ primetime meeting on the network last October (2.12M). Rounding out the network’s slate, Oklahoma State-Baylor pulled 1.03 million (-54% from 2.23M for their October matchup on FOX last season) and Arizona State’s Friday demolition of Arizona drew 1.02 million (-29% from 1.44M for their Saturday matchup last season).
Sister network ABC topped out at 3.33 million for North Carolina-Miami, followed by USC-UCLA at 3.24 million on Saturday Night Football — up 67% from their afternoon meeting last year (1.94M) and the top audience for that rivalry since the previous primetime edition three years ago (2017: 4.05M). ABC opened its tripleheader with 2.54 million for Michigan State-Penn State, down 35% from the teams’ October meeting last season (3.92M).
With Michigan-Ohio State canceled, FOX was left to settle for Utah-Colorado, which averaged 1.70 million in the Big Noon Saturday window. Compared to the previous Pac-12 game in that window, Arizona State-USC last month, viewership fell 27% from 2.33 million. The game was not the most-watched of the weekend on Fox Sports, trailing Wisconsin-Iowa on FS1 later in the day (1.80M).
The full list of 2020 college football TV ratings is available here.
[Nielsen estimates from ShowBuzz Daily 12.15]
