Sunday Final Nationals: Multi-Year Highs for Various Sporting Events on ESPN and YES Network

CBS and AMC shared Sunday leadership. With the “52nd Academy of Country Music Awards,” despite the event drawing its ten-year low in total viewers and a record low among adults 18-49, CBS was Sunday night’s most-watched network with an average of 10.56 million viewers.

The seventh season finale of “The Walking Dead” helped propel AMC to dominate the night (from 7-11 p.m.) in all key demos such as adults 18-49 (approx. 2.5 rating), adults 18-34 (approx. 1.9 rating), and adults 25-54 (approx. 2.8 rating).

ESPN experienced positive ratings for its two sporting events on the night. In the early evening, the “NCAA Div. I Women’s Basketball National Championship” featuring South Carolina versus Mississippi State drew a total audience of 3.89 million viewers (TV+streaming) — a three-year high for the Women’s National Championship. The game peaked at 5,338,000 viewers as the South Carolina Gamecocks were closing in on their first women’s basketball national championship (8 p.m. – 8:15 p.m.). In addition, South Carolina-Mississippi State was the most-streamed women’s basketball finale ever, with a streaming average audience of 59,500 viewers and a total of 211,000 viewers watching 8,205,000 minutes.

Later in the evening, the defending World Champion Chicago Cubs versus their longtime rival St. Louis Cardinals to open the 2017 MLB regular season on ESPN and WatchESPN registered a combined 3.707 million viewers across both platforms, which makes it the most-watched MLB Opening Night game ever on the ESPN family of networks. In terms of TV-only viewers, Cubs-Cardinals (3.62 million) was the most-watched ESPN MLB season opener since Braves-Nationals (3.66 million) in 2008 and the most-watched MLB game overall on ESPN since Yankees-Red Sox in 2011 (4.7 million).

In the early afternoon on Sunday, the very first game of the MLB season – New York Yankees at Tampa Bay Rays – drew a five-year high in Opening Day audience on the regional sports network for the Yankees, YES Network with an average of 445,000 total viewers (and a 4.5 TV household rating) in the New York market.
 
Despite the Yankees’ 7-3 loss to the Rays, Sunday’s Yankees-Rays telecast peaked during the 3:30-3:45 quarter-hour, when 505,000 total viewers tuned in. YES’ telecast was the most-viewed and highest-rated sports telecast in the New York market Sunday, besting all sports programming spanning all national and regional networks.

Yankees-Rays was also seen on ESPN but blacked out in the New York and Tampa markets. The game drew an additional 1.3 million viewers via ESPN.

(Sources: ESPN [1], [2], Sports Media Watch, YES Network)

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* AFF = Number of affiliates (stations) airing the program
* CVG = percent of coverage in U.S.
	Sunday, April 2, 2017
	PROGRAM	AFF*	CVG* (PCT)	HH/Share	Viewers (000)	Adults 18-34	Adults 18-49	Adults 25-54
7-11	Network Average			1.8/3	2933	0.4/2	0.6/2	0.8/3
7:00	America’s Funniest Home Videos (r)	254	93	2.7/5	4675	0.6/3	0.9/4	1.2/4
8:00	Once Upon a Time	254	93	1.8/3	2796	0.6/3	0.8/3	0.9/3
9:00	Match Game	254	93	1.7/3	2497	0.3/1	0.6/2	0.8/2
10:00	American Crime	254	93	1.2/2	1766	0.2/1	0.4/1	0.5/1
	PROGRAM	AFF*	CVG* (PCT)	HH/Share	Viewers (000)	Adults 18-34	Adults 18-49	Adults 25-54
7-11	Network Average			6.3/11	10558	1.2/6	1.9/7	2.7/8
7:00	60 Minutes	253	93	6.0/12	9500	0.7/4	1.1/5	1.7/6
8:00	52nd Annual ACM Awards (s)	253	93	6.4/11	10911	1.3/6	2.1/7	3.0/9
	PROGRAM	AFF*	CVG* (PCT)	HH/Share	Viewers (000)	Adults 18-34	Adults 18-49	Adults 25-54
7-11	Network Average			3.5/6	5773	0.5/2	0.9/3	1.2/4
7:00	Little Big Shots (r)	244	93	2.8/5	4421	0.4/2	0.6/3	0.9/3
8:00	Little Big Shots	246	93	5.1/9	8649	0.7/4	1.3/5	1.8/5
9:00	Chicago Justice	246	93	3.7/6	5905	0.5/2	0.9/3	1.3/4
10:00	Shades of Blue	246	93	2.6/5	4115	0.4/2	0.7/2	1.0/3
	PROGRAM	AFF*	CVG* (PCT)	HH/Share	Viewers (000)	Adults 18-34	Adults 18-49	Adults 25-54
7-10	Network Average			0.9/2	1563	0.5/3	0.7/3	0.8/2
7:00	Bob’s Burgers (r)	255	93	0.7/1	1126	0.3/2	0.4/2	0.5/2
7:30	Bob’s Burgers	258	93	0.9/2	1516	0.5/3	0.7/3	0.8/3
8:00	The Simpsons	257	93	1.2/2	2128	0.6/3	0.9/4	1.1/3
8:30	Making History	258	93	0.8/1	1321	0.4/2	0.6/2	0.7/2
9:00	Family Guy (r)	254	93	0.9/2	1547	0.6/3	0.7/2	0.8/2
9:30	The Last Man on Earth	258	93	1.0/2	1739	0.6/3	0.8/2	0.9/2
	PROGRAM			HH/Share	Viewers (000)	Adults 18-34	Adults 18-49	Adults 25-54
7-11	Network Average			0.8/1	1262	0.3	0.4/2
7:00	Notanserio Univision			0.6/1	933	0.2/1	0.3/1
8:00	Su Nombre Era Dolores			0.8/1	1403	0.4/2	0.5/2
10:00	Aqui y Ahora			0.8/1	1311	0.3/1	0.5/2
	PROGRAM			HH/Share	Viewers (000)	Adults 18-34	Adults 18-49	Adults 25-54
7-11	Network Average			0.4/1	719	0.2/1	0.3/1
7:00	Cine Gladiator (2000)			0.5/1	853	0.2/1	0.3/1
10:00	La Hermandad			0.2/0	315	0.1/1	0.1/0
	PROGRAM			HH/Share	Viewers (000)	Adults 18-34	Adults 18-49	Adults 25-54
7-11	Network Average (preliminary)			0.6/1	1079	0.3/1	0.3/1
7:00	Cine Finding Nemo (2003) (preliminary)			0.4/1	787	0.2/1	0.3/1
8:00	Siempre Niños (preliminary)			0.6/1	1072	0.2/1	0.3/1
9:00	Siempre Niños (preliminary)			0.6/1	1201	0.3/1	0.3/1
10:00	Don Francisco Te Invita (preliminary)			0.7/1	1257	0.3/1	0.4/1

Note: All of this date’s Telemundo data are based on preliminary figures.

Sub-Demo Breakdowns – Sunday 4/02/17

Cable Rankings – Sunday 4/02/17

What follows are the top 250 most-watched shows in prime time on cable (by order of network) for Sunday, April 2:

Source: Live+Same Day data, Nielsen Media Research