Final Ratings: FS1 NASCAR Truck Series Opener Up From Speed In '13, Down From '12

FS1 averaged 1.5 million viewers for the season-opening NASCAR Camping World Truck Series race from Daytona Int’l Speedway last Friday night, up 7% from 1.4 million viewers for the race on Speed last season. The viewership was FS1’s ninth-best audience since its launch last August. While the NextEra Energy Resources 250 was up from ’13, the audience was down 23% from the ’12 audience and down 16% from ’11. Meanwhile, ESPN drew 2.7 million viewers for the season-opening Nationwide Series DRIVE4COPD 300 last Saturday afternoon, down from 3.36 million viewers for last year’s race, which featured a multicar crash at the conclusion of the race that resulted in several fans being injured. The ‘14 figure also is down from ’11, which marked the most-viewed NNS race ever on cable TV as Danica Patrick made her NASCAR debut.

MIX & MATCH: CBS, which airs the WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship in years that NBC has Winter Olympic coverage, drew 2.5 million viewers for the Jason Day-Victor Dubuisson final last Sunday. The event went long and did not conclude on CBS, with Golf Channel drawing 1.7 million viewers for the last 30 minutes. CBS’ audience is down 1% from 2.7 million viewers last year on NBC, when Matt Kuchar defeated Hunter Mahan. However, the audience was up significantly from 1.7 million viewers for the Ian Poulter-Paul Casey final the last time CBS aired it in ’10.

NOTES: ESPN averaged 2.29 million viewers for the Duke-North Carolina men’s basketball game on Feb. 20, marking the lowest audience for the matchup since the teams met in the ACC Tournament in ’11.