The power of an NFL lead-in was on display over the weekend, thanks to a rare pair of Saturday afternoon games on broadcast television.
Airing immediately after a Texans-Chiefs game on NBC, taped coverage of day one of the PNC Championship father-son golf tournament averaged 2.92 million viewers across Nielsen and Adobe Analytics — up 147% from last year and the tournament’s largest day one audience on record (dating back to 1995).
By comparison, Sunday’s live coverage — which had no NFL lead-in but faced the usual throng of Sunday afternoon games — averaged 1.42 million. That was still up 32% from last year, an indication that the “Tiger effect” also played a role in driving viewership. Woods and his son Charlie finished second.
Later in the day, FOX averaged a Nielsen-only audience of 2.23 million for a USC-UConn women’s college basketball game immediately following Steelers-Ravens — easily the most-watched women’s game of the season and second-largest college basketball audience regardless of gender. The only game with more viewers this season was Illinois-Arkansas on CBS Thanksgiving Day, which also had a direct NFL lead-in (5.2M).
Viewership peaked at 3.76 million in the first quarter-hour of play (8 PM ET), an indication of the massive NFL audience the game inherited.
It is typical for sporting events to draw outsized — even record — audiences immediately following NFL games, even if they are facing NFL competition. Earlier this fall, the NWSL delivered its largest audience ever in an NFL adjacent window as 1.5 million watched the league’s taped Skills Challenge, an audience 60% higher than its live championship match two days earlier.
Going back further, the most-watched NBA Christmas Day game on record — Magic-Bulls on NBC in 1993 — aired following an NFL game.
It of course bears noting that neither of Saturday’s post-NFL windows retained much of the preceding audience, as Texans-Chiefs averaged 15.5 million (Nielsen + Adobe Analytics) and Steelers-Ravens 15.4 million (Nielsen only).
