TV Ratings: First Half Of March Madness Down

The first five days of NCAA Men’s College Basketball Tournament -- Thursday through Monday -- witnessed viewership 18% lower to an average 2.5 million Nielsen-measured viewers, reports Mediapost.

In 2019, an average 3.04 million viewers per game was registered through the second round. Last year’s NCAA March Madness event was cancelled, due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

CBS viewing sank 20% to 4.7 million (5.9 million in 2019) across 15 games, while TBS with 14 games was up 2% to 2.36 million; TNT, with 12 games, falling down 16% to 1.7 million; and TruTV with over 11 games slipped 2% to 1.2 million.

This year’s viewing decline is partially attributable to eight second-round games -- typically higher-interest and more competitive contests -- being played on Mondays. This includes two Monday daytime games on CBS. In 2019, all second-round games ran in the generally higher TV viewing weekend days, Saturday and Sunday.

CBS' top three games on the first Sunday of the event -- Syracuse-West Virginia (7.86 million); Wisconsin-Baylor (7.74 million); and Loyola/Illinois-Illinois (6.2 million) -- were lower than the top three CBS games on the first Sunday of the 2019 event: UCF/Duke (12.9 million); Washington/UNC (8.9 million); and Iowa/Tennessee (6.6 million).

This year, WarnerMedia networks had its best results on the weekend, with TBS’ Oregon State-Oklahoma St. (3.6 million) on Sunday and TBS’ Iowa-Grand Canyon (3.17 million) on Saturday.

TBS and TruTV also scored strong results on the opening First Four games on Thursday -- up from 17% to 80% versus the same games in 2019.