Final Ratings: NASCAR Sprint Cup Races Up At Daytona; Nationwide, Truck Series Down

The opening week for NASCAR races was a mixed bag on the TV front. The Daytona 500 on Fox saw its best audience since ’08. Earlier in the week, Speed earned a 1.3 rating and 2.0 million viewers for the Budweiser Duels, up from last year. Meanwhile, ESPN earned a 2.2 U.S. rating and 3.4 million viewers for the NASCAR Nationwide Series season opener last Saturday, which featured a multicar crash at the conclusion of the race that resulted in several fans being injured. Those figures were down from last year’s audience, which marked the most-viewed NNS race ever on cable TV. Danica Patrick was on the pole for last year's race. Despite the drop, the audience this year marked the third-best viewership for the race at Daytona since ESPN re-acquired NASCAR rights prior to the ’07 season. The crash led to an increase for Speed as well, as the net’s “Speed Center” news program cut in for coverage from Daytona. The cut-in averaged 1.1 million viewers, marking the show’s best audience yet. Speed also earned a 0.9 rating and 1.4 million viewers for the season-opening Camping World Truck Series race last Friday, down from last year (Austin Karp, Assistant Managing Editor).

YEAR-OVER-YEAR AUDIENCE FOR OPENING WEEK OF NASCAR RACES
DATE	NET	RACE	RAT.	% +/-	VIEWERS (000)	% +/-
2/21	Speed	Budweiser Duels	1.3	8.3%	1,968	9.6%
2/22	Speed	Camping World Truck Series	0.9	-25.0%	1,402	-28.5%
2/23	ESPN	Nationwide Series	2.2	-24.1%	3,360	-24.2%
2/24	Fox	Sprint Cup Series*	9.9	23.8%	16,700	22.2%

CHART NOTE: * = Race aired on a Monday in primetime last year.

NOTES: Rogers Sportsnet averaged 456,000 viewers for the Blue Jays' first Spring Training game last Saturday, marking the net’s largest audience for a Sprint Training game on record. The audience was 20% higher than the previous record, set on March 23, 2011 (Sportsnet)....Golf Channel continued its best start to a year ever with the net's most-viewed month of February. The net's "Morning Drive," which relaunched on Feb. 4, averaged 119,000 viewers last Saturday, marking the show's most-watched hour yet. Meanwhile, the season premiere of "The Haney Project: Michael Phelps" drew 205,000 viewers on Monday, up 153% from last season's premiere when the show featured a foursome of Adam Levine, Sugar Ray Leonard, Angie Everhart and Mario Batali (Golf Channel)....NFL Network totaled 7.25 million viewers for live and replay telecasts of the NFL Combine from Feb. 23-26, up 11% from 6.51 million viewers last year (NFLN)....FS Midwest is averaging a 5.0 local rating in St. Louis through 14 Blues games to date, up 144% over the same number of contests last year. The Blues drew a 3.5 rating for the '11-12 season, "which was their highest ever" on the net (ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH, 3/1).

The charts below list final Nielsen ratings from recent sports telecasts.

TELECAST	DATE	NET	TIME (ET)	RAT.	VIEWERS (000)
NASCAR Sprint Cup: Daytona 500	2/24	Fox	1:00-5:00pm	9.9	16,700
NBA: Lakers-Mavericks	2/24	ABC	12:56-3:32pm	2.0	n/a
NCAA Basketball: Michigan State-Ohio State	2/24	CBS	4:00-6:00pm	1.9	n/a
WGC: Accenture Match Play: Final	2/24	NBC	2:00-6:00pm	1.8	2,560
NCAA Basketball: Georgetown-Syracuse	2/23	CBS	4:00-6:00pm	1.3	n/a
WGC: Accenture Match Play: Semis	2/23	NBC	2:00-6:00pm	1.3	1,860
"NBA Countdown"	2/24	ABC	12:30-12:56pm	0.8	n/a
Liga MX: CD Guadalajara-Leon	2/24	Telem.	5:55-8:01pm	0.6	1,023
"ESPN Sports Saturday"	2/23	ABC	4:00-6:00pm	0.6	n/a
"75 Years of March Madness: Champs That Never Were"	2/23	CBS	1:30-2:00pm	0.6	n/a
NCAA Basketball: South Carolina-Georgia	2/23	CBS	2:00-4:00pm	0.6	n/a
AMA Supercross Midseason Review	2/24	CBS	12:00-1:00pm	0.6	n/a
PBR 15/15 Bucking Battle	2/24	CBS	1:00-2:00pm	0.6	n/a
"75 Years of March Madness: Top 10 Upsets"	2/23	CBS	1:00-1:30pm	0.5	n/a
NCAA Basketball: Cincinnati-Notre Dame	2/24	CBS	2:00-4:00pm	0.5	n/a
TELECAST	DATE	NET	TIME (ET)	RAT.	VIEWERS (000)
NCAA Basketball: Indiana-Michigan State	2/19	ESPN	7:00-9:25pm	2.3	3,733
NASCAR Nationwide Series: Drive4COPD 300	2/23	ESPN	1:15-4:41pm	2.2	3,360
NBA: Heat-Bulls	2/21	TNT	8:16-10:43pm	1.7	2,448
NBA: Celtics-Lakers	2/20	ESPN	10:42pm-1:13am	1.6	2,253
NCAA Basketball: Missouri-Kentucky	2/23	ESPN	9:00-11:32pm	1.4	2,043
NCAA Basketball: NC State-North Carolina	2/23	ESPN	4:41-5:52pm	1.3	1,993
NBA: Spurs-Clippers	2/21	TNT	10:43pm-1:21am	1.3	1,972
NASCAR Sprint Cup: Budweiser Duels	2/21	Speed	2:00-5:12pm	1.3	1,968
NCAA Basketball: Florida-Missouri	2/19	ESPN	9:25-11:12pm	1.1	1,649
NBA: Spurs-Warriors	2/22	ESPN	10:35pm-1:23am	1.1	1,590