The Super Bowl was a lot better to “New Girl” and “Brooklyn Nine-Nine” than it was to the Denver Broncos on Sunday night.
Despite a blowout game, the Fox sitcoms received massive boosts from their Super Bowl lead-in, hitting series highs, with “New Girl” becoming the highest-rated scripted entertainment telecast on broadcast TV since 2011.
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According to time zone-adjusted numbers, “New Girl” — which featured a guest appearance from Prince — drew an 11.4 rating in the advertiser-sought 18-49 demographic. An earlier version of this story reflected an 11.1 rating — the numbers available at the time. The updated numbers make Sunday night’s “New Girl” the highest-rated scripted broadcast in six years and broadcast television’s highest-rated comedy telecast in nearly 10 years, since the Friends series finale on May 6, 2004 (24.9/54).
“New Girl” also pulled in 26.3 million total viewers.
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“Brooklyn Nine-Nine” followed “New Girl,” drawing a 6.9 rating with 15.1 million total viewers. An earlier version of this story reflected a 6.7 rating with 14.8 million total viewers, the numbers available at the time.
At the time of this writing, final demo numbers for the Super Bowl (and, thus, for Fox) were not in. According to the very early metered-market ratings, the game scored a 47.6 rating/70 share — down marginally from last year’s game, and the lowest ratings for a Super Bowl since 2010.
Fox will surely be in first place outright in the 18-49 demo when the full network’s final numbers are reported later on Monday.
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In the advertiser-coveted metric, Telemundo was second in ratings with a 0.8/2, but sixth in total viewers with 1.8 million, according to preliminary numbers.
ABC was third in ratings with a 0.7/1 and third in total viewers with 2.7 million, airing all reruns.
Univision was fourth in ratings with a 0.6/1 and fifth in total viewers with 1.8 million.
CBS and NBC tied for fifth in ratings, each with a 0.5/1. CBS was second in total viewers with 3.9 million viewers with an all-repeat lineup. NBC was fourth in total viewers with 2.4 million, airing a rerun and a a movie.
The CW was seventh in ratings with a 0.2/0 and in total viewers with 768,000. CW’s stations air local programming on Sunday nights.