Predicting the ratings for Duke-UNC in the men’s Final Four, the UConn-South Carolina women’s national championship and more.
Can Duke-Carolina score basketball’s biggest audience in five years?
No single college basketball matchup moves the needle like the Duke-North Carolina rivalry. In what was thought to be their final meeting of the Mike Krzyzewski era, Carolina’s comfortable win over Duke last month averaged nearly four million viewers on ESPN — easily the largest college basketball audience of the season.
In a made-for-TV set of circumstances, the rivals meet again in the Final Four — their first meeting ever in the men’s NCAA Tournament. Given the unprecedented nature of the matchup, the ongoing storyline of Krzyzewski’s swan song, and the general ratings bump that occurs whenever Duke makes it this far, it is fair to expect a big turnout.
One potential drag on the ratings is the fact that the game is airing on cable. After missing out on the Final Four two years ago, Turner has the games again for the first time in four years. The cable universe has shrunken considerably in just four years time. TBS was in 91.49 million homes when it last carried the Final Four in March 2018, compared to an estimated 78.84 million last month. Sports ratings have held up remarkably well in the decade-plus of cable subscriber erosion, largely because the majority of cordcutters were not watching much live sports to begin with. With that said, it is a lot to ask for viewership to not be affected at all by the shrinking cable universe.
When the CBS/Turner NCAA deal was announced in 2010, TBS was in more than 100 million homes. Even if one believed that cable distribution would stall or decline, it is hard to imagine that the NCAA or the networks had in mind that the Final Four and National Championship would one day air on a network in fewer than 80 million homes.
Duke has played a Final Four game on cable before. In 2015, their matchup against Michigan State averaged 15.3 million on TBS, TNT and TruTV — still the largest audience for the early Final Four slot since 2005. Given the opponent, the storylines, and the later timeslot, it would be surprising if this year’s game did not surpass that mark.
The late game of that 2015 Final Four, undefeated Kentucky losing to Wisconsin, averaged 22.6 million across the same three networks. That remains the largest audience for a national semifinal since 1996. The decline of cable, and of sports viewing, over the past seven years likely puts that number out of reach.
A more realistic goal for Saturday’s game is 20 million, a figure that no basketball game has cracked in five years — since Game 5 of the 2017 NBA Finals. No college game has hit that mark since the North Carolina-Gonzaga National Championship earlier that same year. In the current ratings environment, 20 million would double the average audience of last year’s NBA Finals (~10M) and surpass last week’s Academy Awards (16.6M). It would be one of television’s largest non-football audiences in the two years since mass events first went dark and rank second all-time among basketball games on cable.
Even a figure slightly below the 20 million mark would constitute an unqualified success, given the downward trajectory of linear television. Last year, Gonzaga-UCLA averaged just shy of 15 million viewers on CBS, pending revision (Nielsen undercounted last year’s viewership and corrected figures for last year’s game were not available).
NCAA men’s basketball national semifinal: #8 North Carolina – #2 Duke (8:49p Sat TBS, TNT and TruTV). Prediction: 9.9, 19.46M.
Will UConn’s return boost the Women’s National Championship?
Few can dispute that it was good for the women’s game to have a UConn-free run of National Championship games. By the end of its stretch of four-straight titles in 2016, viewers were seemingly bored of the Huskies. Three of their four-straight national titles during the Breanna Stewart era averaged fewer than 3.3 million viewers, a figure surpassed by each of the four subsequent title games (none of which involved the Huskies).
At the same time, few can dispute that it is a good thing to have UConn make it back for the first time in six years. UConn is arguably the biggest brand in all of women’s basketball, and its stars have the kind of name recognition that is hard for players at other schools to approach.
Having UConn in the mix, but not utterly dominant, is a best-of-both-worlds scenario for the women’s tournament. The Huskies’ absence from the title game paved the way for other schools to build formidable programs, most notably their opponent Sunday night – South Carolina. The Gamecocks are favored to win Sunday night, a far cry from the last time the Huskies made the title game (UConn was favored by 24 that night). Expect viewership to build on last year, when Stanford-Arizona delivered the largest audience for the title game (4.08M, pending revision) since UConn-Notre Dame in 2014 (4.24M) — not coincidentally, the only time in the Stewart era when there was a scintilla of doubt that the Huskies would win.
It should be noted that due to the MLB owners’ lockout pushing back the start of that season, Sunday’s game gets a later-than-usual 8 PM ET start — the first primetime start for the game since it moved to a Sunday in 2017. The downside is that the later start pushes the game in competition with the Grammys, a diminished attraction to be sure, but nonetheless a bigger draw than the average Sunday night show.
NCAA women’s basketball national championship (8p Sun ESPN): #2 UConn – #1 South Carolina. Prediction: 2.3, 4.64M.
More predictions
NBA: Nuggets-Lakers (3:30p Sun ABC). The Lakers are done; do not expect much of an audience for this one. On the same weekend last year, Lakers-Clippers (like so many games of late, played sans LeBron and AD) had a mere 1.0 and 1.76 million (pending revision). Prediction: 1.1, 1.92M.
NASCAR Cup Series: Richmond (3:30p Sun FOX). Ratings have increased for every NASCAR race this season, and there is no reason to expect Richmond to be an exception. Last year’s race had a 2.0 and 3.32 million (pending revision). Prediction: 2.3, 3.81M.
Last week’s predictions
— NCAA men’s Elite Eight: UNC-Saint Peter’s. Prediction: 8.0, 15.2M; result: 7.2, 13.6M.
— NCAA men’s Elite Eight: Duke-Arkansas. Prediction: 6.7, 12.5M; result: 5.2, 10.3M.
— NCAA men’s Elite Eight: Kansas-Miami. Prediction: 5.4, 9.75M; result: 5.3, 9.51M.
— NCAA women’s Elite Eight: UConn-NC State. Prediction: 0.8, 1.37M; result: n.a, 2.04M.
— F1 Saudi Arabian GP. Prediction: 0.8, 1.34M; result: 0.8, 1.45M.
— NASCAR Cup Series: COTA. Prediction: 2.3, 3.67M; result: 2.2, 3.73M.
— Academy Awards. Prediction: 8.2, 16.7M; result: n.a., 16.62M.
