Blacked out on YouTube TV for a second-straight Saturday, ABC topped yet another college football weekend but for the first time this season trailed in two out of three windows.
ABC delivered the largest college football audience of the weekend for a tenth-straight week as Saturday’s LSU-Alabama game averaged 7.54 million viewers, though that figure comes in below the 8.0 million the network was averaging in that primetime window prior to the YouTube TV blackout.
LSU-Alabama notably improved over Oklahoma-Tennessee in the same primetime window a week earlier, but that game faced Game 7 of the World Series.
Earlier in the day, ABC drew 4.87 million for Texas A&M-Missouri — its least-watched game in the mid-afternoon window since Mississippi-Kentucky in week two (4.51M) and well below the 8.2 million that window was averaging before the blackout.
BYU-Texas Tech rounded out the tripleheader with 3.98 million, marking the fifth-smallest ABC audience of the season. While it was a top-ten matchup and the site of “College Gameday,” the Red Raiders’ win was also a rare non-SEC matchup on ABC this season, one of just four total this season. Non-SEC matchups account for two of the network’s bottom five games.
For the first time all season, ABC failed to top the charts in either of the afternoon windows, as competing Big Ten football games topped the charts in both cases.
Indiana’s comeback win over Penn State averaged 6.03 million viewers on FOX “Big Noon Saturday,” trailing only Penn State-Ohio State the prior week (7.19M) and Texas-Ohio State in week one (16.62M) as the network’s most-watched game all season.
Later in the day, Oregon’s comeback win over Iowa averaged 5.37 million on CBS — the network’s second-largest audience of the season, behind the top-ten Indiana-Oregon game in October (5.59M). CBS, which for years dominated the 3:30 PM ET window with its SEC coverage, was the first network other than ABC to win that window this season.
It is of course not possible to determine exactly how much of Saturday’s results were due to the Big Ten pulling viewers way from ABC or the YouTube TV blackout freeing up more viewers to watch other networks. But either way, in a season that ABC has dominated, FOX and CBS each won one of the three main competitive windows on Saturday.
ABC remains the dominant college football network with an average of 6.8 million viewers this season, but that average was slightly higher at 7.0 million before the blackout.
As for ESPN, Georgia-Mississippi State topped the network’s charts with 2.32 million viewers — ranking fourth out of the network’s 12 Noon ET windows this season (third excluding “week zero,” when there are no competitive games). But it was also the first time all season that ESPN has had an SEC game in a window where ABC was carrying another conference.
ESPN also drew 1.20 million for Syracuse-Miami, the network’s second-smallest audience in the mid-afternoon window this season (Tulane-Mississippi had 1.05 million in September). In primetime, Wake Forest-Virginia drew 734,000 — topping only Cal-Oregon State in week one (565K) as the network’s least-watched Saturday game in any window this season.
“College Gameday” led in with 2.2 million, up from the previous week’s season-low of 2.0 million. The pregame show — which was for a second-straight week made available for free on the ESPN app and social media — beat “Big Noon Kickoff” by 74 percent in the 11 AM ET hour, up from 13 percent the prior week, but down from 153 percent before the blackout.
