Ratings and viewership rose for four of ESPN’s five college football windows last week.
Last Saturday’s Wisconsin/Iowa college football game had a 2.0 final rating and 3.2 million viewers on ESPN, up 82% in ratings and 96% in viewership from Iowa State/Baylor last year (1.1, 1.7M) but down 13% and 4%, respectively, from Kansas State/Oklahoma in 2014 (2.3, 3.4M).
The Badgers’ win, which had 3.3 million with streaming included, ranked third for the weekend among college football games behind Alabama/Mississippi on CBS and Ohio State/Penn State on ABC. Head-to-head, it topped ABC’s Louisville/N.C. State game by 25% in ratings (2.0 to 1.6) and 37% in viewership (3.2M to 2.4M).
Shifting to primetime, Mississippi/LSU scored a 1.6 and 2.7 million — up 14% in ratings and 27% in viewership from Washington/Stanford last year (1.4, 2.1M) and up 78% and 104%, respectively, from Stanford/Arizona State in ’14 (0.9, 1.3M). Both of those games aired in a later window. Adding in streaming viewership, the Tigers’ win had 2.8 million.
Sandwiched between those gains, Arkansas/Auburn posted steep declines. The Tigers’ 56-3 obliteration of the Razorbacks sank 29% in ratings (from 1.75 to 1.25) and 23% in viewership (from 2.8M to 2.1M) from Texas A&M/Mississippi last year.
That was the exception to the rule. On Friday night, ESPN earned 1.5 million for Oregon/California — up 312% from Utah State/San Diego State in the same window last year, which aired on ESPN2 (316K). USF/Temple had 1.3 million earlier in the evening, up 7% from Memphis/Tulsa last year (1.2M) but down 20% from Fresno State/Boise State in ’14 (1.6M). The previous night’s Miami/Virginia Tech game also increased, rising 32% over Cal/UCLA in a later window last year (from 1.1M to 1.4M).
ESPN2’s top game of the week was Kansas State/Oklahoma last Saturday afternoon with a 0.8 (-30%) and 1.3 million (-26%). Rutgers/Minnesota topped the charts on ESPNU with just 274,000 viewers (-53%).
(Wknd. numbers via ShowBuzz Daily 10/25, Sports TV Ratings [1], [2], [3)
