Virginia could barely score on the court Tuesday night, but the ratings were a different story.
Tuesday’s Colorado State-Virginia NCAA men’s basketball tournament “First Four” game averaged 1.75 million viewers on truTV, up 1% from Pittsburgh-Mississippi State last year (1.74M) and the most-watched sporting event of the day. The Cavaliers’ low-scoring loss, in which they scored just 14 first half points, averaged more viewers than all four of last year’s “First Four” games.
Wagner-Howard led in with a second-place 1.20 million, down 2% from last year’s 1.22 million for Texas A&M-Corpus Christi against SEMO.
In other college basketball action, the opening night of the NIT averaged 457,000 viewers across ESPN and ESPN2 (352K including ESPNU), up 21% from 378,000 last year.
In the 7 PM ET window, there were nearly as many viewers watching the NIT across all three networks — 1.06 million — as Wagner-Howard in the “First Four.” In particular, Xavier-Georgia drew 520,000 on ESPN, Cornell-Ohio State at 466,000 on ESPN2 and Boston College-Providence at 74,000 on ESPNU.
The subsequent window averaged a combined 1.19 million, including Kansas State-Iowa at 837,000 on ESPN, Richmond-Virginia Tech at 245,000 on ESPN2 and Minnesota-Butler at 105,000 on ESPNU. ESPN2 rounded out the night with 221,000 for UC Irvine-Utah, up 21% from Seton Hall-Colorado last year (174K).
Shifting to the pro game, NBA TV averaged 458,000 for a Nuggets-Timberwolves NBA regular season game — matching Celtics-Kings in a later timeslot last year.
Tuesday, March 19 sports ratings
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Original chart below:
