NBC Is Really Crowing About Its Wild Card Playoff Ratings

NBC really loves the ratings it received for the primetime NFL Wild Card playoff game between the Philadelphia Eagles and Dallas Cowboys. Not only were the ratings high, but they were the highest for NBC since the Super Bowl (thank you, Jay Leno) and the highest for a Saturday primetime program on the network in two decades (thank you for not having original programming on Saturday). Here’s the release:

NBC SPORTS SCORES MOST-WATCHED SATURDAY PRIMETIME WILD CARD EVER

Best Primetime Viewership for Any Network Since Super Bowl

Best Primetime Saturday Viewership on NBC in More Than 2 Decades

NEW YORK - January 12, 2010 - NBC Sports’ coverage of Saturday night's Dallas Cowboys 34-14 blowout victory over the Philadelphia Eagles was the most-watched primetime Wild Card Playoff game ever and also set other ratings milestones:

• Delivered the best primetime viewership for any network in nearly a year – since Super Bowl XLIII on NBC.
• Attracted the biggest Saturday primetime viewership on any network in nearly 16 years since CBS’s tabloid-fueled Lillehammer Olympics coverage.
• NBC’s biggest primetime Saturday audience in nearly 22 years since Saturday night comedy line-up.
  

EAGLES-COWBOYS PRIMETIME GAME: The Eagles-Cowboys game (8:00-11:15 p.m. ET) drew 32.1 million viewers, the most-watched Saturday primetime Wild Card game ever, 15 percent higher than last year’s Colts-Chargers overtime game (27.8 million) and 25 percent higher than the Jaguars-Steelers Wild Card game in Jan. 2008 (25.7 million).  The household rating of 18.0/30 was also the best for any Saturday primetime Wild Card game.
 
JETS-BENGALS AFTERNOON GAME: The Jets-Bengals game (4:30-7:45 p.m. ET) drew 25.0 million viewers, the best Saturday Wild Card Game 1 in more than a decade (Bills-Dolphins, 25.3 million, Jan. 2, 1999), 19 percent higher than last year’s Falcons-Cardinals game (21.0 million) and nine percent higher than the Redskins-Seahawks game in Jan. 2008 (23.0 million).  The household rating of 15.2/29 was also the best since the aforementioned Bills-Dolphins game.

BEST PRIMETIME DELIVERY SINCE THE SUPER BOWL: For the full primetime night (8-11 p.m.) NBC averaged 32.3 million viewers, the biggest primetime viewership on any network since NBC’s broadcast of Super Bowl XLIII, the most-watched program in television history.  NBC Sports Wild Card primetime had more viewers than, among other shows, the 2009 Academy Awards and the 2009 season finale of American Idol.

• The 32.3 million in primetime was the most-watched Saturday primetime on any network since the tabloid-fueled Lillehammer Olympics (Feb. 26, 1994 on CBS, 38.1 million) and NBC’s most-watched Saturday night in more than two decades (Facts of Life, 227, Golden Girls, Amen and Bloopers Special, Feb. 6, 1988, 32.5 million).

I’m sure CBS will have a release touting its Wild Card ratings as well.