NEW YORK (AP) - The first two games of the Boston Celtics and Los Angeles
Lakers series on ABC were more popular than any National Basketball Association
finals since 2004, a boon to a network otherwise off to a tough start to the
summer season.
The series' second game was seen by 13.5 million people Sunday, slightly
higher than Thursday's opener, according to Nielsen Media Research. Sunday's
game was up 57 percent from the second game of last year's San Antonio-Cleveland
series.
Not since 2004, when the Lakers took on the Detroit Pistons, has an NBA
finals attracted this much attention, Nielsen said. The basketball series was
twice as popular as hockey's Stanley Cup series on NBC last week; two games were
seen by more than 6 million viewers.
Good thing for ABC, since the best the network could do otherwise was "The
Bachelorette," which ranked No. 28 for the week.
CBS' "Million Dollar Password" with Regis Philbin did well Sunday, with 9.6
million viewers. That game and Fox's "So You Think You Can Dance" are the
strongest summer series so far.
CBS' wife-swapping drama "Swingtown" debuted with 8.6 million, making it the
sixth most-watched drama of the week, Nielsen said.
With the broadcast networks in summer slumber mode, action heats up on
cable. "Army Wives" had 4.5 million viewers for its season debut on Lifetime,
making it the most-watched original drama in the network's 24-year history.
Similarly, "Ice Road Truckers" reached 3.9 million people Sunday, the
best-ever season launch for a series in the History channel's own history.
CBS won the week, averaging 7.2 million prime-time viewers (4.9 rating, 9
share). Fox had 6.5 million (4.1, 7) and won among the 18-to-49-year-old
demographic it targets. ABC had 6.1 million (4.0, 7), NBC 5.7 million (3.7, 7),
the CW 1.8 million (1.2, 2), My Network TV 1 million (0.7, 1) and ION Television
470,000 (0.3, 1).
Among the Spanish-language networks, Univision led with a 3.2 million
average (1.7 rating, 3 share), Telemundo had 1 million (0.6, 1), TeleFutura
640,000 (0.3, 1) and Azteca 110,000 (0.1, 0).
NBC's "Nightly News" topped the evening newscasts with an average of 7.8
million viewers, while ABC's "World News" had 7.6 million (both 5.3 ratings, 11
share). The "CBS Evening News" had 5.8 million viewers (4.0, 8).
A ratings point represents 1,128,000 households, or 1 percent of the
nation's estimated 112.8 million TV homes. The share is the percentage of in-use
televisions tuned to a given show.
For the week of June 2-8, the top 10 shows, their networks and viewerships:
NBA Finals Game 2: L.A. Lakers vs. Boston, ABC, 13.5 million; NBA Finals Game 1:
L.A. Lakers vs. Boston, ABC, 13.38 million; "Two and a Half Men," CBS, 9.81
million; "60 Minutes," CBS, 9.81 million; "Million Dollar Password," CBS, 9.62
million; "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation," CBS, 9.61 million; "So You Think You
Can Dance" (Wednesday), Fox, 9.56 million; "House," Fox, 9.44 million; "Hell's
Kitchen," Fox, 9.36 million; "So You Think You Can Dance" (Thursday), Fox, 9.25
million.
ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Co. CBS is a division of CBS Corp. Fox is a
unit of News Corp. NBC is owned by General Electric Co. Telemundo is owned by
General Electric. TeleFutura is a division of Univision. ION Television is owned
by ION Media Networks.
Copyright 2008 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be
published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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