NBC ratings crush USA vs. Canada on MSNBC
Many balked about NBC putting Sunday night's thrilling hockey game between the United States and Canada on MSNBC. Turns out they actually know what they're doing.
NBC ratings crush USA vs. Canada on MSNBC
The early television ratings from Sunday night are in.
For all those – including me – who lambasted NBC’s decision of putting Sunday night’s thrilling United States victory over Canada on sister station MSNBC, we can eat humble pie. Turns out NBC does actually know what it's doing, after all.
Nationally, an average of 23.3 million viewers tuned in each half-hour from 7:30 pm EST until 10 o’clock pm EST to watch ice dancing and other Olympic highlights on NBC.
Almost 15 million less people (an average of 8.22 million) tuned into MSNBC in the U.S. during that same time period to watch the United States beat Canada to earn the No. 1 seed and cap off their preliminary round schedule.
That sounds like a win-win for NBC.
Let's put those numbers in perspective:
- Sunday night was the most watched hockey game in the U.S. since May 10, 1973 (Chicago vs. Montral, Game 6). Sunday night’s game had more viewers than Game 7 of the 2009 Stanley Cup Final between Detroit and Pittsburgh.
- It is the second most-watched program in MSNBC history, falling just 8,000 average viewers short of the 2008 Presidential Election coverage.
- MSNBC is available in 78 million households, NBC is available in 112 million households.
Would it have been nice to see the game on NBC? Certainly.
It's tough to say whether the game would've garnered higher ratings on NBC. It seemed like many people just tuned into NBC for Olympic coverage and not to watch a specific event or game.
But here’s why I enjoyed it on MSNBC: they showed the game in its entirety, unlike some of the other games in the preliminary round where they were forced to break away from coverage, and they showed it with limited interruptions. It was annoying to watch some of the other prelim games with seconds of play missing so they could fit in a full commercial between the quick Olympic stoppages.
Plus, I’m biased. I watched the game in HD… MSNBC isn’t available in HD in all areas. Some say that HD has a bigger impact on hockey than it does any other sport.
On MSNBC, the game was also broadcast live Coast-to-Coast instead of on a tape-delay out West.
Now, with much of the country buzzing, NBC will be in a good spot to move the playoff and medal round games over to the big network.
Interestingly, Sunday’s game between the U.S. and Canada – which is still being talked about on Twitter as “Do you believe in Miller-acles?” because of goaltender Ryan Miller’s performances – did beat NBC in some markets.
The Buffalo News reported early today that MSNBC was viewed in 14.6 percent of Buffalo-area households compared to 13.4 percent of the other coverage on NBC.
Buffalo is a true hockey town... but it’d be interesting to see which markets with hockey had MSNBC out-draw big brother NBC during the game. How much of Sunday night’s national ratings come from parts of the country where hockey isn’t even a blip on the radar?
Sunday's game was the most watched program in Canadian television history. An average of 10.6 million - peaking at 13 million people - watched on CTV. A reported 12 million people watched the U.S. beat Canada back on Jan. 6 in the World Junior (Under-20) Championships in Canada.
The 8.22 million viewers in the U.S. would’ve made up more than 24-percent of Canada’s total population.
Follow Frank Seravalli on Twitter for the latest updates at http://twitter.com/DNFlyers.
Comment removed.
Hockey gets very small numbers in national ratings. That is why NBC puts regular season games on in a television dead zone, post-NFL Sunday afternoons. That is also why the main network of NBC chose to broadcast "girly ice dancing" to get ratings so that they could charge advertisers higher fees so that gets-no-ratings hockey can be aired on another network. It's not rocket science, people, if it's not on NBC, check CNBC or MSNBC. BTW, I am a hockey fan.— tbtante- Let me know how many households tune into ice dancing three or four nights a week after the Olympics, excluding Will Ferrell movies.
- Perhaps the most irritating part is that as the same time as the hockey game, CNBC HD was showing curling...CURLING!!! Watching the game in low-def was annoying, but it did not take away from the victory. It was one of the 5 best games I remember seeing.— the_new_catfish
- my parents live in bensalem and have 818 msnbc hd but i live 5 miles away in philly, have comcast, and dont have a msnbc hd channel. wtf?— bruiser81
- Is it me or does NBC want hockey to fail regardless of being Olympic or NHL?? Im holding my breath because they are supposed to have the gold medal game on, but knowing them they will put on the bronze medal event for fastest snow shovel. NBC you suck!!!!!!!— cote32
- Big Tom threw 3!, love how all the time your in here talking trash about hockey. Please tell me what sports have you played? PS3 does not count virgin. Why don't you do something with your life, im sure your mom is fed up with you still living in her house.— cote32
- Stupid, stupid column. It took me 15 minutes to find the bloody hockey game, but three seconds to find the fairies on ice.— General_Turgidson
- I wonder how many people even knew it was on MSNBC.— nellar
