Monday night’s blowout win for Villanova over Michigan in the National Championship Game was entertaining for those who watched and weren’t Wolverines fans. However, the title game delivered a record-low overnight television rating, and not by a little bit, either.
Austin Karp of SportsBusiness Daily shared the following information on Tuesday morning.
Villanova's blowout win over Michigan delivered a 10.3 overnight rating across TBS/TNT/truTV. New low for an NCAA men's title game. Still won the night across ALL OF TV. Rating peaked 10pm ET (11.5), then got down to 7.0 in final 15 minutes. Detroit led markets with 21.4 rating
— Austin Karp (@AustinKarp) April 3, 2018
Last year's North Carolina-Gonzaga title game drew a 14.5 overnight on CBS alone. Previous low for men's championship was UConn-Georgia Tech in 2004 (11.2 on CBS). Simple answer is blowouts suck for ratings. 2018 score is tied with 2009 as most-lopsided men's final since 1992 https://t.co/w9qSFub98g
— Austin Karp (@AustinKarp) April 3, 2018
As Karp notes, blowouts aren’t good for ratings. That said, maybe next year, the NCAA won’t tip off its men’s basketball title game at 9:20 p.m. ET. The late start likely had plenty to do with the ratings as well.
We’ve seen a general decline in ratings across the board in sports this year. The NFL has been in the spotlight due to its preeminence as the king of American sports. However, it’s clear that viewership is either down in general, or that fans are consuming their sports in other ways.