The ACC Championship Game was a real dud on ESPN last week.
The Florida State/Georgia Tech ACC Championship Game drew a mere 1.2 U.S. rating and 2.0 million viewers on ESPN last Saturday night, down 25% in ratings and 29% in viewership from Clemson/Virginia Tech last year (1.6, 2.8M), and down 33% and 36%, respectively, from Virginia Tech/Florida State in 2010 (1.8, 3.0M).
The game ranks as the lowest rated and least-viewed ACC Championship Game ever. The previous lows were a 1.6 (2009 and 2011) and 2.5 million (2009).
Saturday’s game was trounced by the Big Ten Championship Game on FOX (2.9, 5.1M) and the Texas/Kansas State “Saturday Night Football” game on ABC (3.3, 5.2M). (For all conference championship game ratings, click here.)
Earlier in the day, the UCF/Tulsa Conference USA Championship Game drew a 0.4 U.S. rating and 590,000 viewers on ESPN2 — down 87% in ratings and viewership from Southern Miss/Houston on ABC last year (3.1, 4.4M).
The previous night, ESPN2 drew a 0.9 and 1.3 million viewers for the Northern Illinois/Kent State MAC Championship. Last year’s numbers were not available.
The MAC title game was the top program of any kind on ESPN2 last week.
Ratings/Viewership For 2012 College Football Conference Championship Games
| # | Date | Conf. | Winner | Loser | Net | Rating | Viewers |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Sat., 12/1/12 | SEC | Alabama | Georgia | CBS |
9.8
|
16.2M
|
| 2 | Sat., 12/1/12 | Big Ten | Wisconsin | Nebraska | FOX |
2.9
|
5.2M
|
| 3 | Fri., 11/30/12 | Pac-12 | Stanford | UCLA | FOX |
3.0
|
4.9M
|
| 4 | Sat., 12/1/12 | ACC | FSU | Ga. Tech | ESPN |
1.2
|
2.0M
|
| 5 | Fri., 11/30/12 | MAC | No. Illinois | Kent State | ESPN2 |
0.9
|
1.3M
|
| 6 | Sat., 12/1/12 | C-USA | Tulsa | UCF | ESPN2 |
0.4
|
0.6M
|
(Last week’s numbers from Sports Business Daily, Son of the Bronx)
