A special Saturday edition of Monday Night Football dominated the sports ratings charts for Saturday, December 30.
The Cowboys’ controversial win over the Lions averaged a combined 12.9 rating and 26.11 million viewers across ABC (6.9, 13.74M), ESPN (5.4, 11.38M), ESPN2 (0.49, 945K) and ESPN Deportes (0.03, 48K), easily the largest television audience of the day. As previously noted, it delivered the third-largest regular season Monday night audience since 1997, trailing only two games earlier this season (Eagles-Chiefs: 28.96M; Ravens-49ers: 27.61M).
Earlier in the day, Georgia’s 60-point obliteration of Florida State in the Orange Bowl averaged a 5.2 and 10.39 million — the largest audience for the game, excluding years it hosted a College Football Playoff semifinal, since 2017. The Mississippi-Penn State Peach Bowl opened the day with a 4.3 and 7.77 million, up from last year. Additional details on those games are available here.
In other college football action, the Maryland-Auburn Music City Bowl averaged a 1.4 and 2.63 million on ABC — down 16% in ratings and 12% in viewership from last year (Iowa-Kentucky: 1.7, 3.00M) and the least-watched edition of the game since 2019 on ESPN (Mississippi State-Louisville: 2.20M).
The Wyoming-Toledo Arizona Bowl brought up the rear with a 0.6 and 1.10 million on The CW, the network’s second-largest college football audience behind North Alabama-Florida State in November (1.33M). The game also streamed on Barstool Sports.
Outside of football, the most-watched sporting event of the day was Manchester United-Nottingham in the English Premier League, which averaged a combined 0.47 and 877,000 across NBC (0.43, 798K) and Universo (0.04, 79K).
College basketball topped out at a 0.48 and 782,000 for UCLA-Oregon on CBS, followed by Ohio State-West Virginia on FOX at a 0.42 and 755,000 and Creighton-Marquette on CBS at a 0.40 and 687,000. (On the same Saturday last year, the top game was Oklahoma State-Kansas at 1.29 million, followed by Louisville-Kentucky at 1.06 million and San Diego State-UNLV at 893,000, all on CBS.)
Shifting to the women’s game, Ohio State-Michigan drew a 0.29 and 496,000 on FOX and Baylor-Texas a 0.27 and 457,000.
Saturday, December 30 sports ratings
