Ratings Roundup: Tampa Bay Bucs Defeat at SoFi Stadium Creates Most-Watched NFL Game in Week 3; 2021 WNBA Season Grabs Highest Viewership Since 2008

Ratings Roundup: Tampa Bay Bucs Defeat at SoFi Stadium Creates Most-Watched NFL Game in Week 3; 2021 WNBA Season Grabs Highest Viewership Since 2008 By SVG Staff

Friday, October 1, 2021 - 7:00 am

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Ratings roundup is a rundown of recent rating news and is derived from press releases and reports around the industry. In this week's edition, America's Game of the Week on Fox leads the pack with most-watched game of the week, the Shamrock Series between Notre Dame and Wisconsin at Chicago's Soldier Field won the day in college football, the 2021 WNBA season is the most-watched since 2008, and more.

America's Game of the Week on Fox Leads the Pack as Most-Watched Game of the Week America's Game of the Week between the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Los Angeles Rams was the most-watched telecast of the week on any network with 22,604,000 viewers. This also was Fox's most-watched telecast since the NFC Championship in January.

Overall, the Week 3 slate drew 12,626,000 viewers, up 8% over last season's comparable window (11,957,000)

On digital, America's Game of the Week drew an AMA of 513,811 across Fox, NFL, and Yahoo! Sports properties (426,941 AMA), the most-streamed AGOTW this season. In addition, Fox NFL streaming is off to its second-best start ever with an AMA of 436,000 through three weeks. (Twitter)

Packers-49ers Thriller Is Most-Watched Week 3 Sunday Night Football Since 2015 The Green Bay Packers' last-second 30-28 victory over the San Francisco 49ers last night on NBC and Peacock - which featured three scoring plays in the last two minutes and 39 seconds, including the Aaron Rodgers-led drive to the game-winning field goal as time expired - is the most-watched Week 3 NBC Sunday Night Football game since NBC Sports' record-setting 2015 season, based on preliminary data.

Packers-49ers registered a Total Audience Delivery (TAD) average of approximately 21.1 million viewers across NBC TV, Peacock, NBC Sports Digital, and NFL Digital platforms - marking the largest Week 3 NBC SNF audience since Peyton Manning and the Broncos visited the Lions in 2015 (22.2 million TAD viewers) and up 14% from last year's Week 3 SNF game (18.5 million TAD for Packers-Saints, 9/27/20).

For the first time since 2016, NBC Sports has presented an NFL game averaging 20 million viewers in each of the season's first three weeks.

NBC's TV coverage (8:23 p.m.-11:31 p.m. ET) averaged approximately 20.2 million viewers, with a national TV household rating of 10.8/26 - up 8% from last year (10.0/22).

The Average Minute Audience (AMA) for last night's live stream via Peacock, NBC Sports Digital platforms, NFL Digital platforms, Packers and 49ers mobile properties, and Yahoo Sports mobile properties was approximately 910,000 viewers - up 52% from last year's game (600,000).

Top metered markets included Milwaukee (41.8/68), Sacramento (23.9/47), San Francisco (22.8/50), Minneapolis (16.6/34), Denver (16.2/34), Memphis (16.1/28), San Diego (15.5/32), Cleveland and Las Vegas (15.3/30), and Baltimore (14.6/29) (NBC Sports)

ESPN's Monday Night Football Delivers Franchise's Most-Watched Week 3 Game Since 2012 with 14.9 Million Viewers ESPN's presentation of the Monday Night Football matchup between the Philadelphia Eagles and Dallas Cowboys (September 27, 8 p.m. ET) delivered an audience of 14,904,000 viewers (ESPN, ESPN2 and ESPN Deportes), the franchise's most-watched Week 3 presentation since 2012. The viewership is slightly up from the highly anticipated Kansas City-Baltimore showdown in 2020's Week 3 and up 40% from 2019's Week 3 game (Chicago at Washington).

Additionally, the Eagles-Cowboys viewership continued a viewership trend, as ESPN also notched its most-watched Week 1 game since 2013 and its second most-watched Week 2 game since 2014 to go along with the aforementioned most-watched Week 3 game since 2012.

Monday Night Football with Peyton and Eli (ESPN2) delivered an audience of 1.9 million viewers, the game presentation's third straight week of viewership growth (1,899,000 viewers compare to 1,856,000 viewers in Week 2). The show's two most recent episodes now represent ESPN's most-watched alternate telecasts since the concept was largely adopted in 2014 (more than 30 presentations). The Super Bowl-winning brothers will return for Weeks 7 and 8 of Monday Night Football.

Viewership reported by Nielsen for ESPN and ESPN2 includes streaming audience across ESPN, NFL, and Yahoo Sports properties.

Through three weeks, ESPN's Monday Night Football is averaging 14.7 million viewers (three games), up 23% from 2019 (four games) and 17% from 2020 (four games).

Additional Monday Night Football Highlights:

Monday Night Football was the most-watched telecast of the night among households, viewers, and all keys demos: Men 18-34, 18-49, 25-54 and 55 , as well as persons 18-34, 18-49, and 25-54 on ESPN.

Monday Night Football also helped ESPN become the most-watched network (broadcast and cable) in primetime among households, viewers and the same key male and people demos, including P55 (ESPN)

Panthers-Texans Is Most-Watched NFL Network Exclusive Thursday Night Football Game Since 2018 Total viewership for last night's Thursday Night Football game featuring the Carolina Panthers' 24-9 win over the Houston Texans was 7.9 million viewers (TV Digital) - slightly surpassing last week's New York Giants vs. Washington Football Team game to make it NFL Network's most-watched exclusive Thursday Night Football game since 2018 (New York Jets vs. Cleveland Browns, 2018 Week 3).

The 7.9 million viewers for Panthers-Texans on TV and Digital is up 35% versus last year's Week 3 Thursday Night Football matchup between the Miami Dolphins and Jacksonville Jag

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