A battle of undefeated, marquee teams gave the NFL its highest regular season rating in over a decade.
The game between the New England Patriots and Dallas Cowboys drew an 18.0 final rating on CBS last Sunday, the highest rating for an NFL regular season game since 1996. The game drew 29.1 million viewers, which was “the largest TV audience on broadcast or cable since Fox? ‘American Idol’ finale in May.” The rating rose as high as 21.0/36 during the fifteen minute period from 7:30 to 7:45 PM ET.
In the context of sports, the NFL blew away its competition. The 29.1 million viewers is the most for any sporting event outside of the NFL this year. The next closest sporting event was the BCS National Championship Game, which drew 28.8 million viewers in January.
The game drew more viewers than any non-Olympic, non-NFL sporting event for the entire decade — with the exceptions of Game 7 of the 2001 and 2002 World Series (which drew 39.1 and 30 million viewers, respectively), the 2003 Fiesta Bowl (which drew 29.1 million) and the 2006 Rose Bowl (which drew 35.6 million). Game 4 of the 2004 World Series, which saw the Red Sox win their first championship since 1918, came closest to Patriots/Cowboys with 28.8 million viewers.
