University of Tennessee Athletics
ESPN's NCAA Championship Audience Up 34%
April 10, 2008 | Women's Basketball
Tuesday night???s NCAA Women???s Basketball Championship game on ESPN with Tennessee capturing its eighth national title over Stanford, 64-48, was seen by an average of 2,871,000 homes, up 34 percent from last year (2,137,000).?? The game garnered a 3.0 rating, a 30 percent increase over last year???s 2.3 for Tennessee???s defeat of Rutgers, according to Nielsen Media Research.??
Overall, the 2008 tournament was the most-viewed ever on ESPN and ESPN2.??
ESPN averaged 1,367,000 homes, up 42 percent (vs. 965,000) with a rating of 1.4, a 40 percent increase from 2007 (vs. 1.0).??
ESPN2 saw a 31 percent jump in audience over last year (560,000 vs. 427,000), based on a 20 percent increase in ratings (0.6 vs. 0.5).
The three Final Four games averaged 2,531,000 homes, up 28 percent (vs. 1,971,000), based on a rating of 2.6, up 24 percent (vs. 2.1) from 2007 making it the most-viewed since 2004 (2,545,000 households) and highest-rated since 2005 (2.5).??
The semifinals delivered a 2.4 rating (up 20% vs. 2007) with viewership of 2,349,000 households (up 25% vs. 2007).
??
This year was ESPN???s sixth consecutive year of televising all 63 games of the NCAA Division I Women???s Basketball Championship and the 13th year overall of exclusive coverage.?? During the first two rounds, ESPN and ESPN2 presented 48 games within 13 telecast windows in a whip-around format with home market protection.?? ESPN FULL COURT ??? ESPN???s out-of-market pay-per-view package ??? and ESPN360.com, ESPN???s signature live broadband sports network, offered complete game telecasts of all 48 games.?? In addition, ESPNU provided full national telecasts of eight early-round games.
