Ratings and viewership rose across-the-board for the Women’s Final Four, culminating in the most-watched national championship in 18 years.
Last Sunday’s South Carolina-UConn NCAA women’s basketball national championship averaged a combined audience of 4.85 million viewers across ESPN, ESPN2 and ESPNU, up 18% from Stanford-Arizona on ESPN alone last year (4.13M) and the largest audience for the event since 2004 (UConn-Tennessee: 5.58M). The game averaged a 2.6 rating across ESPN and ESPN2 (ESPNU figures were not immediately available), the highest since 2018 (UConn-Notre Dame: 2.8).
The Gamecocks’ win, which peaked with 5.91 million viewers from 10-10:15 PM ET, delivered the fourth-largest audience for the women’s title game since ESPN began airing the event more than a quarter-century ago. It trails only Purdue-Duke in 1999 (5.14M), UConn-Tennessee in ’04 and UConn-Oklahoma in 2002 (5.68M).
ESPN was originally scheduled to carry the season premiere of Sunday Night Baseball in primetime, but the start of the baseball season was delayed due to the owners’ lockout of players. The title game tripled the SNB game ESPN carried in the same window last year (White Sox-Angels: 1.61M).
The complete Women’s Final Four averaged 3.46 million viewers, up 20% from last year and the highest average since 2012.
In the national semifinals last Friday night, UConn-Stanford averaged 3.23 million viewers across ESPN and ESPNU — up 19% from Arizona-UConn last year (2.72M) and the largest audience for a semifinal game since Baylor-Stanford in ’12 (3.76M). The game averaged a 1.8 rating on ESPN alone (+25%).
Louisville-South Carolina pulled 2.16 million earlier in the night, up 27% from Stanford-South Carolina last year (2.05M) and the largest audience for the early semifinal since 2016 (UConn-Oregon State: 2.31M). It drew a 1.2 rating on ESPN alone (+23%).
The full NCAA women’s basketball tournament averaged 634,000 viewers per game, up 16% from last year (546K). Prior to last year, the first two rounds of the tournament aired regionally on on network as opposed to nationally across multiple networks. Keep in mind ESPN releases figures for the women’s tournament on a per-game basis, as opposed to CBS and Turner release viewership for the men’s tournament on a combined, per-window basis.
Most-watched NCAA women’s basketball national championship games
Since ESPN began airing the event in 1996
[Nielsen estimates from ESPN]
