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Cinderella may have left the ball a little earlier than expected, but the relative lack of upsets and buzzer-beaters hasn’t hurt the March Madness TV ratings. If anything, the abundance of blue bloods in the Sweet 16 appears to have sent the Nielsen deliveries soaring.
Through the second round of the men’s tourney, CBS Sports and TNT Sports are averaging 9.4 million viewers, which marks the biggest turnout through this stage since 1993. That same year saw North Carolina beat Michigan 77-71 in the championship game in front of a CBS audience of 32.9 million viewers, which still stands as the third most-watched title tilt on record behind only Michigan-Duke the previous year (34.3 million) and the Bird vs. Magic/Indiana State-Michigan State slugfest in 1979 (35.1 million).
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Sunday’s slate was the biggest draw thus far, as the late afternoon window, which featured Kentucky’s 84-75 win over Illinois on CBS/Paramount+ and Alabama’s 80-66 victory over St. Mary’s on TNT/Max delivered 15.3 million gross viewers. All told, the March 23 lineup—which included Duke’s 23-point blowout of Baylor in the 2:40 p.m. ET window—averaged 10.1 million viewers, an improvement of 13% versus the year-ago figure (8.9 million).
The Nielsen data includes deliveries across the linear TV networks, their respective streaming siblings and the March Madness Live app.
The men’s tourney got off to a hot start on Thursday as CBS, TNT, TBS and truTV collectively scared up a record 9.1 million viewers for the first official day of competition. CBS’s primetime coverage of the Arkansas-Kansas game topped the night with 6.36 million viewers, of whom 1.9 million (or 30%) were members of the adults 18-49 demo.
All told, the first round averaged 8.8 million viewers, up 2% versus the year-ago results.
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While many college hoops enthusiasts have expressed disappointment in the chalky nature of this year’s dance—each of the four No. 1 seeds and three No. 2s have advanced to the Sweet 16, while John Calipari’s No. 10 Arkansas is the only double-digit seed still standing—the lack of underdogs obviously hasn’t cast a pall over the TV numbers. That the partners are sailing into the next stage of the tourney at a 32-year ratings high is particularly impressive given our ever-diminishing TV habit; in the last year alone, HUT levels (industry argot for “households using television) have fallen another 9%, while bundled cable subscribers dropped 12% to 46.9 million homes.
That said, the inclusion of out-of-home impressions to the national TV sample in autumn 2020 and the subsequent expansion of Nielsen’s OOH measurement have helped the NCAA’s media partners claw back a good deal of deliveries that would have been otherwise ignored in a more benighted era. Moreover, the steady rise of virtual MVPDs also has offset some of the subscription losses on the legacy pay-TV front, as these cheaper bundles have lifted the overall video base to 67.7 million homes, which works out to 54% penetration. By comparison, the traditional bundle’s reach is now down to 37% of all U.S. TV homes, down from 91% in 2010.
Play resumes Thursday night with BYU taking on Alabama in the East Regional semis on CBS and Maryland facing Florida out in the West on TBS/truTV. Arizona-Duke caps off CBS’s night in the 9:40 p.m. ET window, while the TNT Sports nets will feature the Arkansas-Texas Tech showdown shortly after 10 p.m.
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