In the business of television, there is no greater platform than primetime: 8-11 PM (7-11 on Sundays). Primetime is the daypart around which the business is oriented, and having the #1 show in primetime is considered the same thing as having the #1 show, period. NBC’s Sunday Night Football has won 13 television seasons in a row, even as it has not topped the 4:25 PM ET national window on FOX or CBS in any of those years. The audiences are bigger at 4:25, but primetime is primetime.
In sports, a great many telecasts air during the afternoon, but the biggest events are reserved for primetime — championship contests, marquee games and the like. To get primetime exposure is to have either achieved great success on the field or great popularity off of it (or both). In most cases, the biggest audiences are in primetime, though that is of course in part because the biggest games are in primetime.
It is hard not to notice that this year has produced any number of strong, championship-level audiences during the day. The three most-watched basketball games of the year aired during the afternoon hours — the United States-France Olympic gold medal game (19.5 million* at 3:30 PM ET), the South Carolina-Iowa NCAA Women’s Basketball National Championship (18.9 million at 3 PM) and the NC State-Duke NCAA men’s regional final (15.4 million at 5 PM ET). (* NBC’s figures combine Nielsen and Adobe Analytics, while all other figures are Nielsen-only.) The most-watched college football game last season was the Rose Bowl, which continues to cling firmly to its 5 PM ET start, and five of last season’s top seven games aired during the daytime. As noted previously, the NFL generates the lion’s share of its top audiences during the 4:25 PM ET window.
As goes without saying, the aforementioned events are all among the biggest in their respective sports. Gold medal games, national championships, playoff semifinals, regional finals. What makes the numbers so interesting is that they have outperformed primetime events of similar import. No primetime basketball game this year has gotten to the 15 million mark, with the NCAA men’s national championship topping the list at 14.8 million. The Rose Bowl outdrew its Sugar Bowl lead-out and the CFP National Championship. It should be noted that out-of-home viewing does play a role, particularly on holidays like New Year’s Day (the Rose Bowl) or Easter (NC State-Duke).
Make no mistake, primetime is still vitally important. NBC for the first time this year aired its marquee Olympic events live during the afternoon and then again in primetime, and while the live afternoon coverage is principally responsible for the network’s viewership success in Paris, the primetime show still generated most of the audience — two-thirds, as of the first week.
Nonetheless, the idea of primetime as the be-all and end-all — a must for a marquee event — no longer seems sacrosanct. On Sundays in particular, it has long been the case that the early evening, dinnertime hours (say, 5-6 PM ET) are well-suited to communal sports viewing. Perhaps a Sunday NBA Finals game starting at 5:30 PM ET may be a better ratings play than one starting at 8:00. It is worth noting that many years ago, it was commonplace for weekend championship events to air in afternoon slots. Michael Jordan’s first NBA Finals game was a Sunday 3:30 PM ET start on NBC. Magic and Bird played Finals games that started at 1:30 PM ET during the CBS era. In those days, the early starts were because the networks were less willing to preempt primetime for live sports.
With the exception of ABC, which rarely gives up primetime for live sports, the networks no longer have such concerns. In its new rights deal with the NBA, NBC will cede an entire weeknight of primetime all season long, replacing its Tuesday night line-up with regular season and (presumably) playoff games. That is in addition to the Sunday night NBA package that begins after its Sunday night NFL schedule concludes. That in itself may be an indication of the lessening importance of primetime. If a “Big Four” network is willing to cede a night that once belonged to the likes of “Frasier” to instead carry a November matchup of the Timberwolves and Thunder, perhaps that is because primetime viewership does not go quite as far as it used to.
To be clear, primetime still has greater prestige (and higher viewing levels) than the afternoon. However, the days when it would be unthinkable to schedule a championship event for the daytime seem to be over. While not all afternoon starts are created equally — 5 PM is preferable to 3 PM, Sunday is preferable to Saturday, etc. — it is increasingly clear that one can generate mass audiences during the daytime without sacrificing much, if any, audience.
Could that mean a Saturday afternoon World Series game? A Father’s Day NBA Finals matinee? Those possibilities are unlikely. Primetime is still the standard for the networks, the advertisers, and Nielsen itself, and thus it makes good business sense to keep as much in that window as possible. There is simply not a ton of logic behind a company like Disney spending so much to retain the NBA Finals and not using it to win every possible night in primetime. Perhaps a compromise move would be to move up Sunday Finals games from 8 to 7 PM ET, early enough to still occupy part of the dinnertime window but late enough to air fully in primetime. (For the World Series, weekend afternoons might be actively damaging, given that is when the biggest football games typically air.)
What the daytime renaissance might mean is that certain events have an advantage airing on a Sunday afternoon than on a Sunday night — much less a weeknight or Saturday. It might mean that ABC keeps the NCAA women’s title game in an afternoon window. It will almost certainly mean that NBC will never go back to embargoing its marquee Olympic events until its primetime window, as was the practice for overseas games until Paris this year. There is no end in sight to late starts and later finishes, but there is at least some argument now for holding the biggest events while the sun is still out.
