An exciting game, big markets, heated rivals and the debut of a marquee venue combined to give NBC blockbuster ratings for Sunday Night Football.
The Giants’ win over the Cowboys drew a 15.1/25 final rating and 24.8 million viewers on NBC Sunday night, up 40% and 39%, respectively, from Steelers/Browns last year (10.8/18 and 17.8 million), and the highest rated, most-viewed regular season NFL telecast on NBC since the network resumed airing games in ’06.
Giants/Cowboys ranks as the highest rated prime time NFL telecast since ’00 (15.2 for Rams/Buccaneers), and the most-viewed since ’97 (27 million for Broncos/49ers).
That being said, these numbers are far from unprecedented for NFL regular season games. FOX drew 25.1 million viewers for its Washington/Giants telecast during Week 1, with CBS’ Steelers/Bears telecast poised to potentially top that number when final results come in. In the past two seasons, FOX and CBS have topped the 24.8 million viewers for Giants/Cowboys on 7 separate occasions — 3 times in ’08 and 4 in ’07.
Still, Giants/Cowboys put in a very impressive performance for NBC, helping the network to its “strongest Sunday night in total viewers” in five years — excluding the Olympics and Super Bowl.
The game also lay waste to Sunday night’s Emmy Awards on CBS, pummeling the awards show by 74% in ratings (15.1 to 8.7), 84% in viewership (24.8 million to 13.5 million), and 133% in adults 18-49 (9.9 to 4.2).
