One of the blue-chip days on the sporting calendar — the opening Thursday of the NCAA men’s basketball tournament — delivered a multi-year viewership high.
Thursday’s opening day of the NCAA men’s basketball tournament averaged a combined 8.4 million viewers per window across CBS, TBS, TNT and TruTV — up 2% from last year and the highest first day average since 2015. (Keep in mind out-of-home viewing has only been included in Nielsen estimates for the past three tournaments.)
As is typical, the early primetime window was the most-watched of the day as the four networks combined to average a 5.5 rating and 10.16 million viewers — actually down 9% and 6% respectively from last year. Notably, TNT was the most-watched network in that window with 3.44 million for Auburn-Iowa (+36%), edging Duke-Oral Roberts on CBS (3.43M, -37%). The Duke game did have a higher rating (2.0 to 1.8).
Also in that window, TBS scored a 0.9 (+1%) and 1.71 million (+7%) for Texas-Colgate and TruTV a 0.8 (+21%) and 1.58 million (+29%) for Northwestern-Boise State.
The late primetime window ranked second for the day with a combined average of 8.5 million, up 11% year-over-year. CBS led the way with a 2.0 (+9%) and 3.48 million (+16%) for Louisiana-Tennessee, followed by Houston-Northern Kentucky on TNT at a 1.4 (+17%) and 2.49 million (+17%). TBS chipped in 1.85 million for Penn State’s rout of Texas A&M (+9%) and TruTV brought up the rear with just 703,000 for UCLA-UNC Asheville (-19%).
Shifting to the afternoon, the early window combined for 6.8 million viewers — the largest audience yet for that window on the opening day of the tournament. Figures were not immediately available for West Virginia-Maryland on CBS, but all three cable games increased double-digits year-over-year, with Utah State-Missouri up 27% on TNT (1.04M), Furman’s upset of Virginia up 13% on TruTV (905K) and Kansas-Howard up 78% on TBS (815K).
The late afternoon window included 1.97 million for Arkansas-Illinois on TBS (+69%), 1.8 million for Princeton’s upset of Arizona on TNT and 1.58 million for San Diego State’s narrow win over Charleston on TruTV. Despite the dramatic nature of the latter two games, each declined double-digits (22 and 15 percent respectively) from last year. Figures for Alabama-Texas A&M-CC on CBS were not immediately available.
In other action, the First Four grossed 5.41 million on TruTV — down 21% from last year (6.89M). Tuesday’s Pittsburgh-Mississippi State game led the way with 1.74 million viewers (-21%), followed by Arizona State-Nevada the following night at 1.38 million (-38%).
As for the 16 seed games, Texas A&M-CC’s win over SEMO was the only game of the round to increase over last year with 1.22 million (+2%). Fairleigh Dickinson-Texas Southern brought up the rear with 1.08 million on Wednesday (-16%).
(Nielsen estimates from Programming Insider 3.17, ShowBuzz Daily 3.15, 3.16, 3.17, CBS Sports/Twitter 3.17)
