NBA Christmas Day Games Topped By ABC's Thunder-Heat With 6.0 Overnight Rating

The NBA’s slate of five Christmas Day games was led by ABC’s telecast of Thunder-Heat in the 5:30pm ET window, with the game drawing a 6.0 overnight rating to mark the net’s fourth-highest NBA regular-season rating ever. The NBA last year opened its season on Christmas, and the comparable Bulls-Lakers matchup in the same 5:30pm window drew a 6.5 overnight. In ’10, when the season was well under way, the 5:30pm game (Heat-Lakers) on ABC drew a 7.3 overnight, which remains the second-best regular-season overnight for the net. Meanwhile, ABC drew a 5.9 overnight for Knicks-Lakers in the 3:00pm window, marking the net’s best Christmas Day early-window overnight on record.

ON CABLE: ESPN also fared well for its slate of three games on Christmas, with the net having its best tripleheader average ever (2.1 overnight). The Celtics-Nets matchup in the 12:00pm window led the way with a 2.7 overnight, which was down from a 4.1 rating for Knicks-Celtics in the same window on TNT last year, but flat compared to ESPN’s Bulls-Knicks game in ’10. Rockets-Bulls at 8:00pm earned a 1.7 overnight, compared to a 1.9 for Magic-Thunder last year and a 1.4 for Nuggets-Thunder in ’10. In the late window (10:30pm), Nuggets-Clippers earned a 2.0 overnight, down from a 2.3 overnight for Clippers-Warriors last year and up big from a 1.3 for Trail Blazers-Warriors in ’10.