Fox Sports 1 aired its least-watched college football opener in four years. In other news, U.S. Open viewership continues to trend above last year, and Mayweather-McGregor gave SportsCenter less of a boost than Mayweather-Pacquiao two years ago.
FS1 Posts Smallest CFB Opener Since ’13
- Thursday’s Tulsa-Oklahoma State college football game scored 382,000 viewers on Fox Sports 1, the network’s least-watched season opener since its first one — Utah State-Wisconsin in 2013 (311K). The Cowboys’ win aired directly opposite Ohio State-Indiana on ESPN, which was the most-watched opening night game on record with over five million viewers.
U.S. Open Viewership Still Trending Up
- Coverage of the U.S. Open averaged 647,000 viewers on ESPN and ESPN2 through Thursday, up 7% from last year (605K) but down 24% from 2015, when Serena Williams‘ attempt at the calendar-year Grand Slam boosted the numbers (847K). Including streaming viewership, the ESPN family of networks have averaged 757,000, still up 7%.
Post-Fight SportsCenter Down From ’15
- ESPN averaged 1.3 million viewers for SportsCenter following last Saturday’s Floyd Mayweather-Conor McGregor fight, down 35% from the post-fight edition following Mayweather-Manny Pacquiao two years ago (2.0M). The 2015 telecast started 40 minutes earlier. Despite the drop, SportsCenter easily topped post-fight coverage on Fox Sports 1 (368K).
[via ShowBuzz Daily 9.1, ESPN PR 9.1, Sports Business Daily 9.1]
