Despite moving from primetime on broadcast to daytime on cable, the Las Vegas Bowl still delivered the top audience in week one of the college football bowl season.
Last Saturday’s Oregon State-Florida Las Vegas Bowl was the most-watched game in week one of the bowl season with a 1.35 rating and 2.45 million viewers on ESPN — up sharply from last year’s New Mexico Bowl in the same window (UTEP-Fresno State: 0.9, ~1.5M), but the least-watched Las Vegas Bowl in eight years (2014 Utah-Colorado State: 2.12M).
The Beavers’ win was originally scheduled for primetime on ABC but was pushed back to the afternoon on ESPN to accommodate a rescheduled Raiders game the next day.
The FCS Celebration Bowl (NC Central-Jackson State) placed second at a 1.4 and 2.42 million on ABC — down from last year, but the second-largest audience for the game in the past six years. (Keep in mind out-of-home viewing was not included in viewership prior to two years ago).
ABC also aired the third and fourth-place games, Fresno State’s rout of Washington State in the LA Bowl (1.2, 2.40M) and BYU’s narrow New Mexico Bowl win over SMU (1.2, 2.04M). The LA Bowl declined double-digits from last year’s equivalent window (BYU-UAB Independence Bowl: 1.9, ~3.2M) and from the inaugural LA Bowl, which aired on ABC in primetime (Utah State-Oregon State: 1.7, ~2.9M).
The New Mexico Bowl declined double-digits from last year’s equivalent window (the aforementioned LA Bowl), but delivered its largest audience since 2013 (Colorado State-Washington State: 2.77M).
Rounding out the top five, Thursday’s Armed Forces Bowl drew 1.99 million viewers on ESPN — down double-digits from last year (Army-Missouri: ~2.6M). Ratings were not immediately available.
In other action, the inaugural Fenway Bowl (Louisville-Cincinnati: 1.1, 1.96M) averaged a smaller audience than every edition of the Yankee Stadium-hosted Pinstripe Bowl; the Boca Raton Bowl (Toledo-Liberty: 1.47M) averaged fewer viewers in primetime Tuesday than on a Saturday morning last year (WKU-Appalachian State: ~1.6M); the Cure Bowl (Troy-UTSA: 0.9, 1.46M) scored a double-digit increase with a move from ESPN2 to ESPN.
Further down the list, the Mobile Bowl (Southern Miss-Rice: 0.7, 1.22M) pulled about even with last year; the New Orleans Bowl (South Alabama-WKU: 1.20M) scored its largest audience since 2018; the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl (Eastern Michigan-San Jose State: 1.11M) and Frisco Bowl (Boise State-North Texas: 0.58, 1.03M) both declined double-digits.
The Myrtle Beach Bowl (Marshall-UConn: 921K) and Bahamas Bowl (UAB-Miami Ohio: 0.52, 822K) brought up the rear, with both within percentage points of last year.
(Nielsen estimates from ShowBuzz Daily 12.20, 12.21, 12.22, 12.23)
