NBC Olympic coverage finishes far behind 2002

NBC’s prime-time Olympics coverage from Turin ended up averaging 20.2 million viewers per night, a 37% decline from the Salt Lake City games four years ago, with an even steeper decline among young viewers.

The closing ceremonies on Sunday had only 14.8 million viewers and was clobbered by ABC’s finale of “Dancing With the Stars.”

It was a disheartening showing for NBC in prime time. The network had promised its advertisers an average of 13 rating points for the games and barely made it: The average rating was 12.2, according to Nielsen Media Research. Each rating point represents 1,102,000 households.

NBC had expected ratings to go down from Salt Lake City due to the time difference and rise in patriotism following the 2001 terrorist attacks but plainly hoped the drop wouldn’t be as steep. Salt Lake City averaged 31.9 million viewers a night, while the 1998 Nagano Games averaged 25.1 million.

Among viewers ages 18 to 49, ratings for the Games in Turin were down 45%. Advertisers are most interested in these young viewers, who abandoned the Olympics in large numbers for Fox’s “American Idol.”

In fact, among this youthful demographic, NBC didn’t even win in prime time last week -- Fox did.

That is an unheard of slump for a television event as popular as the Olympic Games.

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Here are the rankings for national prime-time network television last week (Feb. 20-26) as compiled by Nielsen Media Research. They are based on the average number of people who watched a program from start to finish. Nielsen estimates there are 277.93 million potential viewers in the U.S. 2 and older. Viewership is listed in millions.

*--* 1 American Idol (Wed.) FOX 31.69 2 American Idol (Tue.) FOX 30.16 3 Dancing With the Stars (Sun.) ABC 27.23 4 “Winter Olympics” (Thu.) NBC 25.72 5 “Winter Olympics” (Tue.) NBC 25.08

6 Grey’s Anatomy ABC 24.76 7 American Idol (Thu.) FOX 23.38 8 “Winter Olympics” (Mon.) NBC 22.48 9 Dancing With the Stars (Thu.) ABC 17.70 10 “Winter Olympics” (Sat.) NBC 16.54

11 “Winter Olympics” (Wed.) NBC 16.01 12 “Winter Olympics” (Fri.) NBC 15.93 13 Survivor: Panama, Exile Island CBS 14.84 “Winter Olympics: Closing Ceremonies” NBC 14.84 15 CSI (Thu.) CBS 14.74

16 Cold Case CBS 14.56 17 House FOX 14.18 18 24 (Mon.) FOX 13.70 19 Primetime ABC 12.48 20 CSI: Miami CBS 12.20

21 Two and a Half Men CBS 12.17 22 CSI: NY CBS 12.02 23 60 Minutes CBS 11.77 24 Without a Trace CBS 11.39 25 CSI (Tue.) CBS 10.31

26 NCIS (8 p.m.) CBS 9.91 27 America’s Funniest Home Videos (Sun.) ABC 9.74 28 CSI (Sun.) CBS 9.63 29 NCIS (9 p.m.) CBS 9.56 30 Boston Legal The Simpsons ABC FOX 9.51 9.51

32 America’s Funniest Home Videos (Fri.) ABC 9.42 33 Numb3rs CBS 9.27 34 Wife Swap ABC 9.09 35 King of Queens CBS 8.91

36 Close to Home CBS 8.76 37 Bachelor: Paris ABC 8.62 38 20/20 ABC 8.61 39 Criminal Minds CBS 8.56 40 Courting Alex CBS 8.37

41 Ghost Whisperer CBS 8.29 42 Family Guy FOX 8.12 43 Skating With Celebrities FOX 8.02 44 American Dad FOX 7.70 45 Crimetime Saturday (9 p.m.) CBS 7.58

46 War at Home FOX 7.49 47 How I Met Your Mother CBS 7.41 48 48 Hours Mystery CBS 7.11 49 America’s Most Wanted FOX 6.93 50 Cops (8:30 p.m.) FOX 6.86

51 According to Jim (9 p.m.) ABC 6.61 52 Lost ABC 6.35 53 George Lopez (Tue.) ABC 6.34 54 Cops (8 p.m.) FOX 6.14 55 “Premio lo Nuestro ‘06” Rodney UNI ABC 6.07 6.07

57 Crimetime Saturday (8 p.m.) CBS 6.02 58 Still Standing (8:30 p.m.) CBS 5.98 59 Still Standing (8 p.m.) CBS 5.91 60 George Lopez (Wed.) ABC 5.90

61 According to Jim (8 p.m.) ABC 5.86 62 “Forrest Gump” ABC 5.67 63 Bailando por un Sueno UNI 5.59 64 Freddie ABC 5.05 65 Alborada (Mon.) UNI 4.83

66 WWE Smackdown! UPN 4.71 67 Contra Viento y Marea (Mon.) UNI 4.68 68 Alborada (Tue.) UNI 4.62 69 Contra Viento y Marea (Wed.) UNI 4.60 70 Noche De Estrellas UNI 4.57

71 Alborada (Wed.) UNI 4.50 72 Contra Viento y Marea (Tue.) UNI 4.37 73 Alborada (Fri.) UNI 4.24 74 Charmed (8 p.m.) WB 4.07 75 Cristina (Mon.) UNI 4.02

76 Contra Viento y Marea (Fri.) UNI 3.82 77 Reba (Fri.) WB 3.65 78 Girlfriends UPN 3.54 79 Peregrina (Wed.) UNI 3.48 80 Peregrina (Mon.) All of Us UNI UPN 3.44 3.44

82 Sabado Gigante UNI 3.28 83 Half and Half UPN 3.24 “Final Destination 2” WB 3.24 85 Reba (Sun., 7:30 p.m.) WB 3.23

86 24 (Fri., 9 p.m.) FOX 3.21 87 One on One UPN 3.02 88 Twins WB 3.00 89 Peregrina (Tue.) UNI 2.98 90 Everybody Hates Chris (8 p.m.) UPN 2.95

91 “Agent Cody Banks” WB 2.92 92 24 Encore (Fri., 8 p.m.) FOX 2.91 93 Charmed (9 p.m.) WB 2.86 94 Don Francisco Presenta UNI 2.85 95 Casos Vida UNI 2.76

96 Marco a Sols Vina UNI 2.71 Peregrina (Fri.) UNI 2.71 98 “Futbol Liga Mexicana” UNI 2.59 99 Ver Para Creer UNI 2.58 100 Reba (Sun., 7 p.m.) WB 2.55

101 “Just Married” WB 2.51 102 Living With Fran WB 2.42 103 What I Like About You WB 2.24 104 Everybody Hates Chris (9 p.m.) UPN 2.14 105 Cuerpo del Deseo (Mon.) Tierra de Pasiones TEL TEL 2.03 2.03 (Mon.)

107 Cuerpo del Deseo (Wed.) TEL 1.98 108 “Orange County” WB 1.81 109 Cuerpo del Deseo (Fri.) TEL 1.77 110 Cuerpo del Deseo (Thu.) TEL 1.74

111 Tierra de Pasiones (Wed.) TEL 1.72 Love Inc. UPN 1.72 113 Cuerpo del Deseo (Tue.) TEL 1.70 114 “Black Knight” UPN 1.64 Tierra de Pasiones (Tue.) TEL 1.64

116 Eve UPN 1.59 117 Tormenta (Mon.) TEL 1.56 118 Tormenta (Wed.) TEL 1.49 119 South Beach UPN 1.45 120 Veronica Mars UPN 1.36

121 Tormenta (Tue.) TEL 1.35 122 Tierra de Pasiones (Fri.) TEL 1.28 123 Tormenta (Fri.) TEL 1.24 Corazon Partido (Mon.) TEL 1.24 125 Tormenta (Thu.) TEL 1.23

126 Decisiones (Fri.) TEL 1.18 127 Decisiones (Mon.) TEL 1.16 128 Tierra de Pasiones (Thu.) TEL 1.14 129 Decisiones (Tue.) TEL 1.10 130 Decisiones (Wed.) TEL 1.08

131 Corazon Partido (Wed.) TEL 0.97 132 Corazon Partido (Tue.) TEL 0.94 133 Sin Fronteras TEL 0.87 134 Corazon Partido (Fri.) TEL 0.76 135 Decisiones (Thu.) TEL 0.69

136 Corazon Partido (Thu.) TEL 0.64 137 Cinemundo del Sabado TEL 0.62 138 Accion Extrema (Sun.) TEL 0.59 139 Accion Extrema (Sat.) TEL 0.49 140 Factor Miedo TEL 0.30

141 Cinemundo Premier TEL 0.29

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Network averages

Here is the number of viewers (in millions) that each network averaged per hour of prime time, for last week and for the season.

*--* Network Last week Season to date NBC 19.51 10.10

FOX 15.55 9.27

ABC 11.28 11.56

CBS 10.03 12.70

UNI 4.35 4.05

WB 2.80 3.28

UPN 2.63 3.24

TEL 1.08 1.14

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