Posted by Bud on June 01, 2010 at 15:30:33:
As expected, the television ratings for last night's Game 2 of the NHL Stanley Cup Finals were fantastic, both locally and nationwide.
Here in Chicago, the game aired on WMAQ-TV Monday night. According to the Nielsen Company, the overnight rating for that broadcast was a whopping 25.1 and a 39 share, which equates to approximately 878,000 households in the Chicago market having the game turned on. As usual, the game ratings peaked at the very end, being seen in almost 1.15 million households -- a 48.8 share.
These are record numbers for a hockey game aired on Chicago television.
Saturday night's Game 1 drew an impressive 16.8 overnight rating locally (approx. 588,000 households). Game 2 eclipsed that number.
The Blackhawks beat Philadelphia in ratings Monday night, as well as in the final game score. Chicago had a 25.1 rating, while Philly had an 18.5 rating.
As big of a win it was for the Chicago Blackhawks, it was also a win for NBC. The national overnight Nielsen ratings for the Blackhawks/Flyers game were a 4.1 and a 7 share. That makes it the highest on record for the second game of the NHL Finals, and up 21 percent from last year's Detroit-Pittsburgh contest. The rating reached its highest point in the last half-hour with a 4.7. The broadcast averaged 5.91 million viewers. These are the highest overnight ratings for a NHL Finals Game 2 since at least 1975, which is as far back as the records go.
All ratings data is preliminary. More true totals, which could be even higher, will be available tomorrow. These numbers do not reflect DVR ratings (recorded programs watched after the main air date), which could push the ratings higher yet. Those numbers take a few weeks to finalize.
Unfortunately for NBC, the next two games in this series will be on the cable/satellite channel Versus. Game #3 will be Wednesday night and Game #4 will be Friday night -- both at 7:00pm on Versus. Should the best-of-seven series need Games 5, 6, or 7, those will all air nationally on NBC.