The final Pac-12 football game dominated sports ratings for Friday, December 1.
As previously noted, the Pac-12 Championship scored its largest audience ever as 9.25 million viewers tuned in to Washington’s defeat of Oregon on ABC. The Huskies’ win delivered easily the largest sports audience of the day on any network and became the ninth college football game this season to top the nine million mark (that figure is now 11 after the weekend). More details here.
Likely owing in part to the competition, ESPN had its least-watched NBA doubleheader of the season with an average of 1.25 million for Sixers-Celtics (1.30M) and Nuggets-Suns (1.19M). Both games averaged a 0.7 rating. There were no games on the comparable Friday of last season, Black Friday.
Over on ESPN2, a top-ten men’s college basketball matchup of UConn and Kansas clocked in at a 0.37 and 651,000, preceded by St. John’s-West Virginia at a 0.19 and 333,000. There were no comparable games a year ago. In other college basketball action, Purdue-Northwestern drew a 0.16 and 375,000 and Maryland-Indiana a 0.11 and 236,000 on Big Ten Network.
Shifting to golf, the second round of the World Challenge — Tiger Woods’ first tournament since the Masters — drew a 0.27 and 422,000, up 69% in ratings and 78% in viewership from last year (0.16, 237K).
Not included in the below chart is “WWE Smackdown” on FOX, which averaged a 1.2 rating and 2.04 million viewers.
Friday, December 1 sports ratings
