One day after the women’s tournament finished with a record-high, ratings and viewership hit record-lows for the NCAA men’s basketball tournament final.
Monday’s UConn-San Diego State NCAA men’s basketball national championship averaged a 7.8 rating and 14.69 million viewers on CBS, down 15% in ratings and 14% in viewership from Kansas-North Carolina on TBS, TNT and TruTV last year (9.1, 17.05M) and the lowest rated and least-watched title game on record. The previous lows were last year’s 9.1 and just shy of 16 million for Villanova-Michigan in 2018, which also aired cable.
The previous lows for a title game on CBS were a 9.4 and 17.08 million for Baylor’s rout of Gonzaga two years ago. The past three title games rank among the four least-watched on record.
UConn has played in two of the five least-watched title games overall — its 2004 win over Georgia Tech ranks fifth (17.09M) — making it the only team with multiple games in the bottom five.
Least-watched NCAA men’s national championship games
The Huskies’ ho-hum win still delivered the largest basketball audience of the past year, surpassing last year’s NBA Finals clincher (Warriors-Celtics Game 6: 7.5, 13.99M). As one would expect, it also outdrew Sunday’s record-high audience for the LSU-Iowa women’s title game on ABC (5.2, 9.92M).
Compared to college football’s national championship — a 65-7 Georgia wipeout of TCU in January — the title game was no match for a 8.7 and 17.22 million on the ESPN family of networks.
In the key young adult demographics, the national championship averaged a 3.7 rating in adults 18-49, a 2.9 in 18-34 and a 4.4 in 25-54 — each down from last year’s title game on TBS, TNT and TruTV (4.7, 3.5, 6.0). Among basketball games over the past year, it tied for fourth in 18-49, fifth in 25-54 and ranks seventh in 25-54, trailing NBA Finals games in each.
Largest basketball audiences, past year
As previously reported, viewership declined for the national semifinals on Saturday. UConn’s rout of Miami declined double-digits, wiping out what was a slight gain for San Diego State’s buzzer-beating win over Florida Atlantic.
The complete NCAA men’s basketball tournament averaged a combined 9.55 million viewers per window across CBS, TBS, TNT and TruTV, down 7% from last year but up 4% from 2021.
(Nielsen estimates from Programming Insider 4.4, ShowBuzz Daily 4.4, network PR)
