The NHL returned to ABC with its largest Black Friday audience in five years. Plus: numbers for the ACC/Big Ten Challenge and golf’s “The Match.”
ABC’s NHL return is most-watched Black Friday game since ’16
Airing an NHL game for the first time since 2004, ABC averaged a 0.7 rating and 1.23 million viewers for last Friday’s Rangers-Bruins NHL Thanksgiving Showdown — the largest audience for the annual Black Friday game since 2016 (Rangers-Flyers: 1.33M). Compared to the previous edition of the game two years ago, which featured the same two teams on NBC, ratings actually fell a tick (vs. 0.8) but viewership increased 3% (from 1.20M).
The Rangers’ win, which peaked with 1.57 million viewers, delivered the largest audience of the NHL season. The previous high was 983,000 for Penguins-Lightning on ESPN Opening Night.
In other NHL action, Flyers-Oilers averaged 212,000 viewers on TNT Wednesday — down 51% from Blues-Penguins in an earlier timeslot on NBCSN two years ago (436K). That constituted a rebound from the previous week, when TNT averaged a season-low 126,000 for Maple Leafs-Kings.
Duke, UNC, OSU and Michigan lift ACC/Big Ten Challenge
Ohio State’s upset of Duke in the ACC/Big Ten Challenge averaged 1.31 million viewers on ESPN Tuesday night, up 49% from Illinois-Duke last year (881K) but down 18% from Duke-Michigan State in 2019 (1.59M). Florida State-Purdue drew 863,000 earlier in the night (-27%).
On Wednesday, Michigan-North Carolina averaged 1.11 million — up 90% from Pittsburgh-Northwestern last year (582K) but down 28% from Ohio State-North Carolina in ’19 (1.54M). The Louisville-Michigan State lead-in drew 806,000 (-10%).
Brooks v. Bryson “Match” tops last Black Friday edition
The latest edition of golf’s “The Match” — this time pitting Brooks Koepka against Bryson DeChambeau — averaged 1.2 million viewers across TBS, TNT, TruTV and HLN, up 13% from last year’s Black Friday edition (1.0M). Compared to the previous edition of “The Match” in July, viewership fell 29% from 1.7 million.
Great numbers for hockey on Black Friday.
Paulsen, are you surprised this was so high? And do you think having this on the ESPN/ABC platform helps the ratings?
Finally, has there been any schedule for the New Years Winter Classic game? I am quite surprised this doesn’t have a time slot listed yet for this big hockey event that gets its best regular season ratings?