ESPN's first year with U.S. Open exclusivity resulted in the tennis tournament's best overall viewership in four years. Two weeks of telecasts across ESPN and ESPN2 averaged 1.27 million viewers, marking the best figure since CBS and ESPN2 averaged 1.44 million viewers in '11. This year also was up 20% from '14. Telecasts this year delivered the best audience among males 18-34 in six years. Meanwhile, WatchESPN had its best tennis tournament figures yet. The platform set new daily tennis records four times during the U.S. Open, with Sunday's Novak Djokovic-Roger Federer men's final setting the high mark. USTA digital properties also saw increases this year. USOpen.org drew 16.2 million unique visitors over 14 days of the tournament, up 3% from 15 days last year. The site had 64.5 million visits, up 10.5%. There also was a shift to mobile for U.S. Open digital this year, with 63% of all digital engagement coming from mobile devices.
JUST FOR KICKS: NBC last Saturday drew 1.25 million viewers for Liverpool-Manchester United, marking the net's most-viewed EPL match since Jan. 31, when Manchester City-Chelsea drew 1.35 million viewers. Meanwhile, Fox on Sunday aired the first-ever Bundesliga match on broadcast TV in the U.S, drawing 926,000 viewers for a re-air of Bayern Munich-Augsburg after its NFL singleheader coverage. Last week's national team friendlies also performed well. UniMas drew 1.58 million viewers for U.S.-Brazil on Sept. 8, while ESPN2 drew 1.01 million viewers for the same match. But that combined viewership was still below what UniMas drew for Mexico-Argentina on Sept. 8 (2.99 million viewers).
NOTES: FS Southwest on Wednesday drew a 5.47 local rating in Dallas-Ft. Worth for the Rangers-Astros game, marking the net's best game audience of the '15 season. That figure tops the 5.34 rating for Tuesday's same matchup. The large ratings come as the Rangers swept a four-game series with the Astros and climbed into first place in the AL West....Through two weeks of college football games, ABC, ESPN, ESPN2 and ESPNU have combined to average 2.07 million viewers for 36 games, up from 1.69 million viewers for 38 games at the same period last year....WNBA regular-season games averaged 202,000 viewers across ESPN/ESPN2 this season, down 14% from last year. However, the league averaged 56,000 viewers for games on NBA TV, a record for the cable net.
The charts below list viewership for recent sports telecasts.
| TELECAST |
DATE
|
NET
|
TIME (ET)
|
VIEWERS
(000)
|
| NFL Kickoff: Steelers-Patriots |
9/10
|
NBC
|
8:41-11:29pm
|
27,398
|
| "Sunday Night Football": Giants-Cowboys |
9/13
|
NBC
|
8:31-11:45pm
|
26,766
|
| NFL: Ravens-Colts (80%) |
9/13
|
CBS
|
4:25-7:27pm
|
23,287
|
| NFL: (singleheader) |
9/13
|
Fox
|
1:00-4:05pm
|
20,100
|
| NFL: (regional) |
9/13
|
CBS
|
1:03-4:10pm
|
14,885
|
| "Football Night in America" |
9/13
|
NBC
|
7:30-8:15pm
|
12,293
|
| College Football: Oregon-Michigan State |
9/12
|
ABC
|
8:06-11:54pm
|
7,898
|
| College Football: Notre Dame-Virginia |
9/12
|
ABC
|
3:30-7:10pm
|
5,744
|
| "Fox NFL Sunday" |
9/13
|
Fox
|
12:00-1:00pm
|
5,377
|
| College Football: Oregon State-Michigan |
9/12
|
ABC
|
12:01-3:22pm
|
4,493
|
| "The NFL Today" |
9/13
|
CBS
|
12:00-1:03pm
|
3,886
|
| Soccer friendly: Mexico-Argentina |
9/8
|
UniMas
|
10:32pm-12:41am
|
2,994
|
| College Football: Georgia-Vanderbilt |
9/12
|
CBS
|
3:30-7:24pm
|
2,571
|
| College Football: Iowa-Iowa State |
9/12
|
Fox
|
4:30-7:45pm
|
1,785
|
| MLB: (regional) |
9/12
|
Fox
|
1:00-4:30pm
|
1,768
|
| Soccer friendly: U.S.-Brazil |
9/8
|
UniMas
|
8:20-10:32pm
|
1,575
|
| EPL: Manchester United-Liverpool |
9/12
|
NBC
|
12:30-2:30pm
|
1,200
|
| "Fox NFL Kickoff" |
9/13
|
Fox
|
11:00am-12:00pm
|
1,025
|
| Premier Boxing Champions |
9/12
|
NBC
|
4:00-6:00pm
|
1,000
|
| Liga MX: Club America-Tigres UANL |
9/12
|
Univision
|
5:55-8:04pm
|
997
|
Bundesliga:
Bayern Munich-Augsburg (taped) |
9/13
|
Fox
|
4:00-6:00pm
|
926
|
| "College Football Today" |
9/12
|
CBS
|
3:00-3:30pm
|
767
|
| LPGA: Evian Masters: Final Round |
9/13
|
NBC
|
12:30-2:00pm
|
696
|
| "Premier League Goal Zone" |
9/12
|
NBC
|
2:30-3:00pm
|
609
|
| Global Rallycross (taped) |
9/13
|
NBC
|
4:00-6:00pm
|
564
|
| Dew Tour: L.A. Skate Vert (taped) |
9/12
|
NBC
|
3:00-4:00pm
|
509
|
| Lucas Oill Off Road Racing |
9/12
|
CBS
|
2:00-3:00pm
|
482
|
| Liga MX: Tijuana-Chivas |
9/11
|
Azteca
|
10:20pm-12:33am
|
445
|
"World of X Games:
Being -- Danny & Makua" |
9/13
|
ABC
|
4:30-5:00pm
|
371
|
"World of X Games:
Being -- Dream Big" |
9/13
|
ABC
|
4:00-4:30pm
|
358
|
| "World of Adventure Sports" |
9/13
|
NBC
|
2:00-3:00pm
|
319
|
| Liga MX: Pachuca-Toluca |
9/12
|
Telemundo
|
9:00-11:08pm
|
296
|
| Cycling: Vuelta a Espana (taped) |
9/13
|
NBC
|
3:00-4:00pm
|
256
|
| TELECAST |
DATE
|
NET
|
TIME (ET)
|
VIEWERS
(000)
|
| College Football: Ohio State-Virginia Tech |
9/7
|
ESPN
|
7:54-11:16pm
|
10,585
|
| College Football: Oklahoma-Tennessee |
9/12
|
ESPN
|
5:57-9:19pm
|
4,129
|
| U.S. Open: Men's/Women's quarterfinals |
9/8
|
ESPN
|
7:07pm-1:12am
|
3,321
|
U.S. Open: Men's Final:
Novak Djokovic d. Roger Federer |
9/13
|
ESPN
|
6:58-11:00pm
|
3,153
|
| College Football: LSU-Mississippi State |
9/12
|
ESPN
|
9:59pm-12:48am
|
3,121
|
NASCAR Sprint Cup:
Federated Auto Parts 400 (Richmond) |
9/12
|
NBCSN
|
8:03-11:01pm
|
3,060
|
| "NASCAR Pre-Race" |
9/12
|
NBCSN
|
7:30-8:03pm
|
2,439
|
| U.S. Open: Round of 16 |
9/7
|
ESPN2
|
7:13pm-12:05am
|
2,239
|
| College Football: USF-Florida State |
9/12
|
ESPN
|
11:31am-3:09pm
|
2,216
|
