College Football TV Ratings Unimpressive, Awaiting SEC's Kickoff
College football television ratings have not been pretty, but they're about to receive a big boost this weekend.
Miami vs. Louisville from this past weekend drew the best audience of the week, pulling in a 2.1 rating (down 9% from last year in the same 7:30 p.m. ABC slot) and averaging 3.80-million viewers. Only two games of the weekend, Miami vs. Louisville and UCF vs. Georgia Tech (3:30 p.m. on ABC), drew north of 3-million viewers.
Only five games over the opening three weeks of the season have crested that 3-million viewer plateau, led by the sole 4-million viewers game with Duke vs. Notre Dame last week, which drew a 2.4 rating and 4.32-million viewers.
The ratings have not been good – for reference, 13 games over the first three weeks of last year drew north of 3-million viewers with five games drawing audiences of over 5-million. In fairness, the games haven't been as good yet this year, and the SEC is yet to play.
That all changes this weekend when the SEC kicks off.
There's no real marquee SEC matchup, but we do have Florida vs. Ole Miss, LSU vs. Mississippi State, a ranked matchup between Auburn and Kentucky, and Alabama is playing.
Outside the SEC, there's two other meetings where both teams are ranked (No. 22 Army at No. 14 Cincinnati and No. 24 Louisville at No. 21 Pittsburgh), as well as Texas and Oklahoma both returning to national television for a Fox doubleheader against Texas Tech and Kansas State, respectively.
Any real measure of how down the ratings are will come from this upcoming weekend.
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