A Notre Dame thriller gave FOX its second-largest college football audience in the past five years.
Saturday’s Notre Dame/Stanford college football game scored a 4.3 final rating and 7.3 million viewers on FOX, the network’s highest rated and most-watched college game since the 2013 Michigan State/Ohio State Big Ten Championship (7.9, 13.9M) and its second-highest since it last aired BCS coverage in 2010.
Compared to previous Thanksgiving Saturday games on FOX, Stanford’s last-second win increased 231% in ratings and 266% in viewership from Notre Dame/USC in the afternoon last year (1.3, 2.0M) and 115% and 120%, respectively, from Notre Dame/Stanford in primetime two years ago (2.0, 3.3M).
The game was easily the top primetime college football game of the week, finishing ahead of Oklahoma/Oklahoma State on ABC by 54% in ratings (4.3 to 2.8) and 53% in viewership (7.3M to 4.8M). It was the season’s third game on FOX to top ABC’s Saturday Night Football head-to-head, compared to two such games in the previous three years.
In other action, Friday’s Washington/Washington State game had a 1.0 final rating and 1.5 million viewers on FOX — down 23% in ratings and 27% in viewership from Arizona/Arizona State last year (1.3, 2.1M) and down a tick and 11%, respectively, from the same Washington/Washington State matchup in 2013 (1.1, 1.7M).
Fox Sports 1 scored a 0.6 and 1.4 million for Texas Tech/Texas on Thanksgiving night, down a tick in ratings but up 4% in viewership from TCU/Texas last year (0.7, 1.3M) and up a tick and 32%, respectively, from Texas Tech/Texas in 2013 (0.5, 1.0M). The Red Raiders’ win was the most-watched college game on FS1 since Michigan/Utah on opening night (2.9M).
