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Local Nielsen ratings snapshot (Thurs.-Sun., Oct. 3-6) -- Cowboys hit 1.5 mil+ while losing to Pack

By ED BARK
@unclebarkycom on Twitter
The Dallas Cowboys drew their largest D-FW crowd of the season while also surpassing the 1.5 million viewers mark for the first time. They also have now lost two in a row after beating up on three patsies.

The Game 5 loss to the Packers (34-24), which was Fox’s mid-afternoon/early evening national attraction, averaged 1,564,368 viewers during a running time that extended to 6:56 p.m. Among advertiser-prized 18-to-49-year-olds, Cowboys-Packers drew 578,649 viewers, falling just short of the 598,701 viewers for the preceding week’s prime-time loss to the New Orleans Saints on NBC.

The Peacock’s Sunday Night Football matchup, with the Indianapolis Colts upsetting the heavily favored Kansas City Chiefs, then pulled in 537,326 total viewers, with 232,033 of them in the 18-to-49 sweet spot.

Saturday’s college football parade was easily paced by Texas’ high-scoring win over West Virginny on ABC’s mid-afternoon/early evening stage. The game averaged 360,484 total viewers before the network’s Ohio State-Michigan State matchup dominated prime-time with 231,254 viewers. Numbers were unavailable for ESPNU’s telecast of SMU’s big comeback win Saturday night over Tulsa. But given the relatively obscure venue, it’s very unlikely that it came close to the Ohio State-Michigan State face-off, except perhaps in the overtime period as word spread.

In Friday’s prime-time festivities, CBS again swept prime-time in total viewers with its regular lineup of Hawaii Five-0 (204,405), Magnum, P.I. (163,238) and Blue Bloods (210,850). Fox’s debut of WWE Friday Night Smackdown ran second from 7 to 9 p.m. with 102,024 total viewers but ranked as prime-time’s No. 1 draw among 18-to-49ers with 42,069.

Thursday night’s numbers game again put Fox’s Thursday Night Football in complete charge. The down-to-the-last-seconds Seattle Seahawks-Los Angeles Rams game averaged 489,715 total viewers and 206,251 in the 18-to-49-year-old realm.

Thursday night’s five new competing series continue to be largely overlooked in comparison, especially NBC’s freshman comedy duo of Perfect Harmony (40,810 total viewers) and Sunnyside (34,008 viewers). CBS’ new trio was led by The Unicorn, which drew 163,238 viewers in the 7:30 p.m. slot. Unicorn fell off sharply among 18-to-49-year-olds, drawing just 25,781 of ‘em to lag well behind football and ABC’s competing Grey’s Anatomy (54,427 for its second half-hour).

Here are the Thursday-Friday local news derby results.

Thursday -- WFAA8 won in total viewers at 10 p.m. while NBC5 ran first with 25-to-54-year-olds (main advertiser target audience for news programming). Fox4’s 10 p.m. edition again was pushed out of this competition by the football overrun.

WFAA8 swept the 6 a.m. competitions and Fox4 did likewise at 5 p.m. The 6 p.m. golds went to WFAA8 in total viewers and Fox4 among 25-to-54-year-olds.

Friday -- WFAA8 again took the 10 p.m. crown in total viewers, with Fox4 winning among 25-to-54-year-olds.

WFAA8 again swept the 6 a.m. competitions while NBC5 notched twin wins at both 5 and 6 p.m.

The still turbulent early morning ratings landed longtime kingpin Fox4 in third place with total viewers on both Thursday and Friday, with NBC5 taking second place behind WFAA8. The ups and downs in the 6 a.m. hour make it anyone’s guess who might prevail in the November “sweeps” ratings period, which begins on Halloween this year.

Email comments or questions to: unclebarky@verizon.net