With the league-leading Cowboys riding a franchise-record winning streak, their Thanksgiving Day game was a huge television draw.
The Week 12 Washington/Dallas NFL Thanksgiving special had a 14.5 rating and 35.1 million viewers on FOX Thursday afternoon, per Nielsen fast-nationals — up 1% in ratings and 8% in viewership from Panthers/Cowboys on CBS last year (14.3, 32.5M) and up 2% and 10%, respectively, from Eagles/Cowboys on FOX in 2014 (14.2, 32.0M).
The Cowboys’ win ranks as the most-watched NFL regular season game, regardless of network, in 21 years — since Chiefs/Cowboys on NBC Thanksgiving 1995 (35.2M). The previous high over that span was 34.5 million for Patriots/Giants in Week 17 of the 2007 season, in which the Patriots clinched an undefeated regular season. That game was simulcast on CBS, NBC and NFL Network.
It also ranks as the most-watched NFL regular season game ever on FOX (dates back to 1994) and the highest rated Thanksgiving Day game on any network since Packers/Lions in 2011 (14.8).
As goes without saying, Thursday’s game delivered the largest NFL audience of the season. The Cowboys have played in the three most-watched games and four of the top five, the lone exception being Vikings/Lions earlier in the day on CBS (27.6M). The 14.5 rating was the fifth-highest of the season.
Outside of the NFL playoffs, it was television’s second-most watched program this year — behind Game 7 of the Cubs/Indians World Series (40.0M) but ahead of the Academy Awards (34.3M), the top night of the Olympics (33.4M) and Game 7 of the Cavaliers/Warriors NBA Finals (31.0M). That excludes political events that grossed a larger audience across multiple networks.
Locally, Thursday’s game had a 30.0 rating in Dallas-Ft. Worth and a 23.2 in Washington (D.C.).
(Thu. numbers from Fox Sports)
