The final game of the Los Angeles Lakers season delivered the largest cable audience of the NBA Playoffs.
Monday’s Lakers-Nuggets first round NBA playoff Game 5 averaged 4.53 million viewers across TNT (3.96M) and truTV (568K), up 6% from Grizzlies-Lakers Game 4 last year (4.26M) and the most-watched game of the playoffs on cable. The five-game Nuggets-Lakers series delivered four of the seven largest audiences of the first round thus far.
The Nuggets’ narrow, series-clinching win delivered the tenth-largest audience of the NBA season. The Lakers, who were eliminated Monday, headlined six of the 11 (six of the top nine excluding All-Star festivities). The defending champion Nuggets played in five of the top 12, though four were against the Lakers and the fifth was Christmas Day against the NBA’s other top television draw — Golden State.
As one would expect, Lakers-Nuggets delivered the top sports audience of the day. The NBA took the top two spots, with Celtics-Heat Game 4 leading in at 3.01 million (TNT: 2.69M; truTV: 327K) — down 14% from Bucks-Heat a year ago (3.50M). Unlike last year, both games overlapped with Thunder-Pelicans Game 4 on NBA TV, which chipped in 567,000.
The NBA Playoffs is now averaging 3.12 million viewers, down 8% from 3.40 million last year. Across the primary broadcasters ABC, ESPN and TNT/trutV, the games are averaging 3.49 million, down 5% from last year’s 3.69 million.
In the NHL playoffs, ESPN averaged 1.22 million for Lightning-Panthers Game 5 and 988,000 for Stars-Golden Knights Game 4 in a standalone doubleheader — up 17 and 188 percent respectively from Devils-Rangers (1.04M) and Golden Knights-Jets (462K) last year, which overlapped with a competing doubleheader on TBS.
Elsewhere, FS1 drew just 180,000 for a Twins-White Sox Major League Baseball game.
Monday, April 29 sports ratings
Updated chart:
Original chart below (includes WWE Raw):
