Monday, October 13, 2008

Close to 1 million DFW viewers watch Cowboys go down

Local Nielsen ratings snapshot (Fri.-Sun., Oct. 10-12)

By Ed Bark of UncleBarky.com

Sunday's Debacle in the Desert -- the Cowboys' loss to Arizona -- came on Fox's watch this time.

Both the network and Fox4 in D-FW gladly will accept the big win in the Nielsen ratings.

Running from 3:15 to 6:43 p.m., the game amassed an average of 857,331 D-FW homes, with a high of 983,982 in tow during the closing 15 minutes. Misery loved company when the Cardinals blocked a punt and recovered it in the end zone for the game-winner in overtime.

This season's record-holder is still the Sept. 15th Cowboys-Eagles shootout on Monday Night Football, which averaged 930,399 total homes on ESPN/TXA21.

QB Tony Romo's broken finger obviously only makes matters worse, Both he and oldster Arizona QB Kurt Warner were pounded to the turf time and again during a game that in Cowboys' annals ranks at or near the very top of bizarre, almost unfathomable finishes.

Note that your friendly content provider's alma mater football team, the Wisconsin Badgers, took a 48-7 pasting from Penn State at home Saturday night on ESPN's featured national telecast. Oh, my aching cheesehead. Luckily the game drew an average of just 21,920 homes. Thanks for not watching.

Elsewhere on Saturday's college football front, ABC's telecast of the Texas-Oklahoma thriller averaged 401,874 D-FW homes from 11 a.m. to its 2:37 a.m. closing time.

Friday's biggest prime-time draw, a new episode of CBS' Ghost Whisperer, lured 146,136 homes before the network's following new series, The Ex-List, dipped to barely half that crowd with 75,504 homes. Look for CBS to cross it out before the November "sweeps" kick in.

In Friday's local news derby, WFAA8 swept the 5, 6 and 10 p.m. contests in both total homes and with 25-to-54-year-olds, the main advertiser target audience for news programming.

Fox4 claimed the other golds, running the table at 6 a.m. while WFAA8 slid to third place in both measurements.

Pegasus News content partner - UncleBarky.com

Check out Uncle Barky's blog for his report on the demise of Shale.tv.

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