TV Ratings: NFL Sunday Night Football Scores For NBC

NBC’s coverage of Sunday’s Cincinnati Bengals-Baltimore Ravens NFL wild-card playoff game drew the largest prime-time audience for any program since Super Bowl Sunday — customary for a Sunday night wild-card game — but was surpassed one day later by the Dallas Cowboys’ 31-14 victory over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, reports The L-A Times citing Nielsen data.

The Bengals’ 24-17 victory averaged 26.87 million viewers, the most for a prime-time program since NBC’s 15-minute Super Bowl LVI postgame show averaged 54.065 million viewers on Feb. 13, according to live-plus-same-day figures released by Nielsen Wednesday. Viewership on Peacock and NFL digital properties boosted the audience to 28.6 million.

The simulcast of Monday’s night’s Dallas-Tampa Bay playoff game averaged 31.2 million viewers on ABC, ESPN and ESPN2 and was ABC’s largest audience for an NFL playoff game outside of Super Bowls.  Sunday’s broadcast viewership was down 7.1% from the 28.935 million average for last season’s Sunday prime-time wild-card game, the Kansas City Chiefs’ 42-21 victory over the Pittsburgh Steelers. That game was also the highest prime-time program since its preceding Super Bowl Sunday.

“NCIS” led all non-sports prime-time programs between Jan. 9 and Sunday, averaging 7.927 million viewers, seventh behind two NFL games, two NFL pregame shows, ESPN’s coverage of the College Football Playoff title game and Fox’s 11-minute NFL postgame show. The episode began a crossover with the two other elements of the CBS franchise, which accounted for three of the week’s six top rated non-sports programs. “NCIS: Hawai’i” which followed, was third among non-sports programs, averaging 7.357 million viewers, ninth overall. “NCIS: Los Angeles” averaged 6.804 million viewers, sixth among non-sports programs, 12th overall and first among programs beginning at 10 p.m., when broadcast television viewing is customarily lower.

Two prime-time NFL playoff games gave NBC the largest weekly viewership of any network during the 17-week-old 2022-23 television season, averaging 9.57 million viewers, topping the previous high of 8.31 million by Fox the week of Oct. 31-Nov. 6, when it aired 19 hours of prime-time programming, including four World Series games. NBC has finished first 14 times this season.

CBS was second, averaging 4.96 million viewers. Fox was third, averaging 4.2 million viewers and ABC was fourth, averaging 2.43 million viewers.

The top 20 prime-time programs consisted of two NFL games; three NFL pregame shows; one NFL postgame show; ESPN’s coverage of the College Football Playoff title game; nine CBS scripted programs and “60 Minutes”; NBC’s “Chicago Fire” and “Chicago Med” and its coverage of the Golden Globe Awards.

📺BROADCAST EVENING NEWS

New week, same trend: ABC World News Tonight with David Muir is the top-rated evening newscast for the week of January 9, according to TV Newser.  With the week of Jan. 9 win, World News Tonight has now defeated its competition from NBC and CBS 215 of the past 216 weeks in average total viewers—and 143 of the last 145 weeks among adults 25-54.

WNT averaged 9.07 million total linear viewers during the week of Jan. 9, 2023, a -2% decline from the previous week of Jan 2 but the largest audience on all of U.S. television, excluding sports programming, of course. The newscast also averaged more than 1.5 million viewers from the key A25-54 demo this past week, which is -3% from the prior week. The week-to-week losses aren’t particularly surprising considering the prior week’s news cycle was dominated by breaking news concerning the House speaker vote. In fact, on Tuesday, Jan. 3, Day 1 of the vote, World News Tonight delivered its most-watched telecast (9.98 million) in nearly two years.

NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt averaged 7.53 million total viewers during the week of Jan. 9, 2023, making it the third-most-watched U.S. show of the week, excluding sports, specials and syndication. The newscast averaged 1.32 million adults 25-54 last week, No. 2 on U.S. TV (also excluding sports, specials and syndication). That’s -3% and -3%, respectively, from what the newscast drew in those measurements the week prior. Nightly News is -7% in total viewers and -9% in A25-54 viewers from what it averaged during the year-ago week.

CBS Evening News with Norah O’Donnell averaged more than 5.54 million total viewers this past week, -2% from the previous week and -4% vs. the year-ago week. The newscast also averaged 887,000 adults 25-54 this past week, which is -6% from the previous week but -14% from the year-ago week.

📺LATE NIGHT TV

Graphic Courtesy of RoadMN

CNN is considering the hiring of a comic host in prime time, an idea that comes on the heels of the success of Greg Gutfeld’s late-night program on Fox News Channel.   The move by CNN would be a big one if it happens, shifting the network’s prime-time lineup from a series of news anchors talking about the day’s news and political events to one with a more entertainment-tinged, comedic focus.  

On Fox, Gutfeld has gradually grown into a ratings powerhouse since launching a revamped late-night comedy and political commentary show in 2021.  The Gutfeld show is modeled as a conservative alternative to the late-night humor espoused by the more left-wing hosts on traditional network shows, such as CBS’s Colbert and ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel.  

📺CABLE TV

The College Football Playoff title game topped the cable rankings, averaging 16.627 million viewers, fifth for the week. Viewership for Georgia’s 65-7 victory over Texas Christian University on Jan. 9 in a game the Bulldogs led 38-7 at halftime was down 25.3% from the 22.257-million average for the previous year’s game, a 33-18 victory by Georgia over Alabama in which the Bulldogs trailed 9-6 at halftime.

ESPN won the cable network battle for the fifth consecutive week and 10th time in 12 weeks, averaging 2.922 million viewers. Fox News Channel was second, averaging 2.16 million and MSNBC third, averaging 976,000.

Graphic Courtesy of RoadMN

In terms of individual programming, TV Newser reports The Five is the most-watched cable news show for the week, averaging 3.55 million total viewers. Tucker Carlson Tonight is second place in total viewers (3.225 million at 8 p.m.), with Jesse Watters Primetime (2.84 million at 7 p.m.), with Hannity (2.70 million at 9 p.m.) and Special Report with Bret Baier (2.60 million viewers at 6 p.m.) rounding out the top five.

Tucker Carlson Tonight took the top spot on cable news among adults 25-54, per usual, averaging 435,000 viewers from the measurement at 8 p.m. The Five ranks No. 2 (400,000) followed by Watters (308,000), Hannity (301,000) and Gutfeld! (296,000) rounding out the top five in the key demo.

Fox News had the 13-most-watched cable news shows for the week, and 14 of the top 15 (MSNBC’s The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell ranked No. 14 — 1.3 million at 10 p.m.) Fox News also had the top 14 cable news shows of the week among Adults 25-54. CNN’s Erin Burnett Outfront ranked No. 15 (157,000).

📺STREAMING TV

Ginny & Georgia

The second season of “Ginny & Georgia” was Netflix’s most-streamed television program for the second consecutive week, with viewers spending 162.72 million hours watching the 10 episodes in the first full week they were available, according to figures released by the streaming service Tuesday. Viewership was down 9.8% from the 180.47 million hours watched the previous week when the episodes of the dramedy were available for four days.

The mystery thriller about an 1830 murder at the U.S. Military Academy, “The Pale Blue Eye,” was Netflix’s most popular movie, with 39.86 million hours watched in its first full week of release, 7.2% less than the 42.96 million hours watched the previous week when it was available for three days.

“Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery” dropped to third behind “The Hatchet Wielding Hitchhiker” after back-to-back first-place finishes.