- Buckeyes-Wolverines: ABC’s Most-Watched Noon ET Game in More than 18 Years; Up Significantly from ’14 Matchup and Most-Streamed Game of the Week on WatchESPN
- Black Friday Football: ABC Televises Most-Watched Day-After-Thanksgiving Game in 10 years; ESPN in 5 years
- Rivalry Saturday: ABC Up In Each TV Window
Then-No.8 Ohio State at No. 10 Michigan (noon ET on ABC) earned a 6.4 HH rating resulting in 10,830,000 viewers, the highest-rated and most-watched college football game of week 13 across all networks. Additionally, ‘The Game’ is tied for the second highest-rated and is the third most-watched college football game of the season, both across all networks.
Additional Buckeyes-Wolverines Superlatives
- ABC’s most-watched noon game in more than 18 years (Nov. 22, 1997), a game which also featured the same two teams.
- Third most-watched Buckeyes-Wolverines matchup on ABC on record – notably surpassing the 2002 matchup (Ohio State’s BCS National Championship season), but trailing the 2006 and 1997 matchups.
- Up 32% in viewership from last year’s matchup (Ohio State’s College Football Playoff National Championship season) between the two teams (Nov. 29, 2014, at noon on ABC).
- On WatchESPN, it was the most-streamed game of Week 13, adding 118,000 average minute impressions to the TV audience and a total of 455,000 unique viewers resulting in 25,000,000 minutes watched.
*All ABC records date back to 1991
Black Friday Football
No. 4 Iowa at Nebraska (Nov. 27 at 3:30 p.m.) averaged 6,189,000 viewers, ABC’s most-watched Black Friday game in 10 years (Texas A&M at Texas on Nov. 25, 2005) and up 111% from the same TV window last season (Stanford at UCLA on Nov. 28, 2014).
No. 7 Baylor at No. 19 TCU (7:30 p.m. on ESPN**) averaged 5,108,000 viewers, ESPN’s most-watched Black Friday game in five years and the fourth most-watched regular season Friday game ever on ESPN (109 games). The Big 12 battle was up 68% from the same window last year (Virginia at Virginia Tech on Nov. 28, 2014).
**Start of the game was delayed due to weather
Additional Week 13 Highlights
- ABC Saturday Night Football featuring No. 3 Oklahoma at No. 11 Oklahoma State (8 p.m.) averaged 4,794,000 viewers, up 45% from the same window last year (Oregon at Oregon State on Nov. 29, 2014).
- ABC regional action on Nov. 28 at 3:30 p.m. (No. 22 UCLA at USC or No. 14 North Carolina at NC State) averaged 4,222,000 viewers, up 5% from same window last season (Baylor at Texas Tech and Michigan State at Penn State on Nov. 29, 2014).
- 1 Clemson at South Carolina (Nov. 28 at noon on ESPN) averaged 2,943,000 viewers, up 46% from the rivals’ matchup last year, played also the Saturday-after-Thanksgiving at noon on ESPN (Nov. 29, 2014).
- WatchESPN was up 55% in average minute impressions, unique viewers, and total minutes viewed, respectively, in week 13 compared to the similar calendar week last year (week 14 of the college football season).
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Media contact: Derek Volner at 860-384-9986; Derek.Volner@ESPN.com and @DerekVolner
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