The Stanley Cup Final ended as it began, with multi-year lows.
Game 6 of the Penguins/Sharks Stanley Cup Final earned a 3.7 overnight rating on NBC Sunday night, down 34% from Lightning/Blackhawks last year and Blackhawks/Bruins in 2013, both of which aired on a Monday (5.6 for both). There was no Game 6 in 2014.
The Penguins’ title-clinching win ranks as the lowest rated Game 6 in the metered markets in a full decade, since Hurricanes/Oilers in 2006 (2.2). That was the last Game 6 to take place on a Saturday night, the least-watched of the week.
This year’s Game 6 took place on a Sunday night, typically the most-watched of the week. Yet it was not a typical Sunday due to major breaking news coverage on cable.
Keeping that caveat in mind, the 3.7 overnight is also the lowest for the clinching game of the Stanley Cup Final since Senators/Ducks Game 5 in 2007 (2.5), and the second-lowest since at least 1999.
Overall, five of the six Penguins/Sharks games hit a multi-year low in the overnights.
Game 6 had a 35.1 rating in Pittsburgh, actually down 5% from Game 5 on Thursday (36.9). It may be the case that there was greater out-of-home viewing in the market than Game 5, or even that the breaking news coverage caused some viewers to skip the game. In the Bay Area, Game 6 had a 9.2 rating — the highest ever for a Sharks game on the NBC family of networks.
(Sun. numbers from NBC)
