“Sunday Night Football” continues to reward NBC for its expensive investment, leading the network to its fourth straight premiere week victory in the key 18-49 demo. Primetime pigskin had some help, of course, from “Blindspot” (pictured above), “The Voice” and a pretty good “Heroes: Reborn” result.
CBS came in two-tenths behind NBC in the main demo, and finished first in total viewers for the seventh straight year. That network was powered by the “Big Bang Theory” wedding, “Thursday Night Football,” and strong a start for “Limitless.” NBC was runner-up in that second Nielsen metric by an average of 2 million viewers.
ABC, Fox and the CW finished third, fourth, and fifth, respectively, by both measurements.
Here are the averages for the initial 7-day period of the fall season:
Adults 18-49
NBC: 2.7/9
CBS: 2.5/8
ABC: 1.7/6
Fox: 1.6/5
CW: 0.3/1
Total Viewers
CBS: 10.9 million
NBC: 8.9 million
ABC: 6.9 million
Fox: 4.2 million
CW: 1.0 million
“Blindspot” debuted last Monday as NBC’s top-rated series premiere in two years, thanks in large part to a strong lead-in from “The Voice.” The Jaimie Alexander-starrer also grew nicely with eventual 3-day delayed viewing.
“Heroes: Reborn” came in as the net’s biggest Thursday drama debut in six years, going up against “T.G.I.T.” on ABC and “Thursday Night Football” on CBS. Of course, that said, NBC has regularly used Thursdays for its comedy lineup in past years.
All numbers above are Live Plus Same Day ratings.