The non-playoff college football bowl games hit a five-year high on ESPN; the NBA on TNT started the new year on a quiet note; the NHL likely set a broadcast TV low for coverage opposite the NFL last weekend.
ESPN networks hit five-year high for non-playoff bowl games
The non-playoff college football bowl games averaged 2.7 million viewers across the ESPN networks, up 14% from last year and the highest average excluding the playoff-affiliated bowls since the 2019-20 season. Five games on ABC averaged 5.0 million viewers (+71%), and 25 on ESPN averaged 2.4 million (+15%).
Five bowl games hit at least a ten-year high and 14 were the highest in five. That includes the last of the bowl games this past weekend, the Buffalo-Liberty Bahamas Bowl — which averaged its top audience since 2016 with 1.14 million.
Of the 33 total ESPN-controlled bowl games, only 12 declined from last year — the last of which being last Friday’s Texas State-North Texas First Responder Bowl, which at 1.70 million fell 39% from last year on the day after Christmas (Texas State-Rice: 2.80M).
Quiet start to ’25 for NBA on TNT
Tuesday’s Lakers-Mavericks NBA regular season game averaged a combined 1.15 million viewers across TNT and truTV, followed by Celtics-Nuggets at 1.06 million. TNT did not carry games on the comparable Tuesday night last year. Compared to the network’s year-ago Thursday doubleheader, both games declined 20% from a pairing of Celtics-Bucks (1.43M) and Suns-Lakers (1.32M).
Going back to last Thursday, Sixers-Warriors and Celtics-Timberwolves both averaged 1.2 million, down 24 and 43 percent respectively from last year’s equivalent games (Nuggets-Warriors: 2.1M; Bucks-Spurs: 1.5M).
Figures for Wednesday’s ESPN games — including a Thunder-Cavaliers matchup pitting the two best teams in the league — were held up by a Nielsen delay as of Thursday evening.
NHL hits broadcast TV low for Rangers-Blackhawks opposite NFL
In its first NHL games this season, ABC averaged 1.1 million viewers for Rangers-Capitals last Saturday and just 454,000 for Rangers-Blackhawks opposite NFL games last Sunday — the latter almost certainly the least-watched NHL regular season game ever on broadcast television.
Figures for Wednesday’s TNT games were held up by a Nielsen delay as of Thursday evening.
