Long one of the league’s biggest television draws, the Warriors are not exactly moving the needle in Stephen Curry’s absence.
Warriors-Thunder averaged a 1.1 rating and 1.90 million viewers on the latest edition of ABC’s “NBA Saturday Primetime,” topping only a January 2024 matchup against the Pelicans — a non-exclusive Wednesday game added as filler programming due to the Hollywood writers and actors strikes — as Golden State’s least-watched ABC game since the network resumed airing the NBA in 2002 (123 total dating back to April 2008).
Outside of that 2024 strike filler, no Warriors game on ABC had previously drawn fewer than 1.93 million — that figure coming exactly six years earlier in March 2020, when Eric Paschall led depleted Golden State over Philadelphia in the 15th and final victory of an ultimately shortened season.
Not coincidentally, Curry was absent due to injury both then and now. The Warriors G has not played since January 30 and is not expected to return for at least ten more days. He has already missed all four Warriors games on ABC over that span and is also out for Golden State’s “Sunday Night Basketball” game on NBC this weekend against the Knicks.
Sans-Curry, Warriors games on ESPN/ABC, NBCUniversal and Prime Video are averaging 1.59 million viewers (nine telecasts). Not counting tentpole events like Christmas and Opening Week, that average is actually up from the 12 games Curry played on those networks this season (1.57M). But the stretch of games without Curry has coincided with a higher-rated portion of the calendar, featuring the kind of exclusive broadcast network matchups that are backloaded until after the NFL season. Those marquee games are essentially performing on par with lower-profile contests in the early months of the season.
For the second-straight weekend, the Warriors played in the least-watched of four NBA games on broadcast television. All three Sunday windows had more viewers, with ABC averaging a 1.4 and 2.41 million for Celtics-Cavaliers and a 1.8 and 3.34 million for Knicks-Lakers — both up sharply from last year’s lower-profile pairing of Nuggets-Thunder (1.87M) and Suns-Mavericks (2.03M).
NBC’s “Sunday Night Basketball” matchup of Rockets-Spurs averaged a Nielsen-only 1.4 and 2.47 million on NBC, with the latter figure rising to 3.2 million including a Spanish-language simulcast on Telemundo and streaming audience tracked by Adobe Analytics. That is also up dramatically from last year’s comparable window, Cavaliers-Bucks on ESPN (1.9M).
Warriors-Thunder, it should be noted, plunged 60% from last year — but the comparable year-ago matchup was Lakers-Celtics (4.6M).
Going back to last Thursday night, Golden State’s upset win over the Rockets on Prime Video averaged 967,000 viewers, down 11% from last year on TNT and truTV (Sixers-Celtics: 1.09M). The game actually held up better relative to last year than its Lakers-Nuggets lead-out, which sank 30% from Lakers-Knicks a year ago (2.0M). But Lakers-Nuggets was still considerably stronger at a 0.8 and 1.39 million, delivering the largest NBA audience on Prime Video since the NBA Cup Final in December.
In other recent NBA action, Mavericks-Celtics averaged a 1.0 and 1.69 million on ESPN last Friday night in Jayson Tatum’s return from an Achilles injury — nearly doubling Grizzlies-Mavericks last year (934K). Clippers-Spurs followed with 1.12 million (-1%). ESPN also drew a 0.9 and 1.58 million for Thunder-Knicks last Wednesday night, also up sharply from Heat-Cavaliers last year (1.04M), followed by Bulls-Bucks at 1.05 million.
NBC averaged 1.9 million (Nielsen + Adobe Analytics) for its March 3 regional window, which featured Spurs-76ers in most markets and Suns-Kings on the West Coast. That was NBC’s “throwback” night, which saw Bob Costas, Doug Collins, Mike Fratello and Jim Gray on the broadcast for San Antonio’s 40-point rout of Philadelphia.
