Less than two weeks ago I wrote about the Big East’s big surge in TV ratings for its top tier games on FS1. There were caveats, yes, but in sum, it was a great signal, particular as negotiations with FOX for a reup of the TV contract are ongoing.
After seeing the results of the Big East Tournament come in, we can say undoubtedly that the league is in the best place its been from a TV ratings perspective since it was still with ESPN.
The Big East Tournament Championship game between Marquette and UConn set a post-reformation record, garnering 1.68 million viewers and a TV rating of 0.9 on FOX Saturday night. That’s the highest viewership number since it was still on ESPN in 2013.
But one game alone is not indicative of health. Breaking out each of the game windows, all but one game saw a year over year increase to combine for a 54% year over year jump. That’s unheard of.
Yes, some of that is borne by the fact one of the semifinals moved from FS1 to FOX, and happened to have UConn involved, which made for a 110% YOY increase, but even MU vs Providence, two modest fanbases saw a 10% bump and that’s without a gigantic lead-in, as last season’s 2nd semifinal had.
I’m still waiting to see if I can find what 2023’s first game number was, but as it didn’t make the top-150, it was definitely less than this season’s 273K number. All put together, the Big East grew viewership by 53.5% compared to 2023.
What makes this such a big deal for me is that there were no Big Ten lead-ins and non-UConn games also experienced significant growth. This tells me the league as a whole had a much broader reach compared to 2023.
If you are interested in more TV numbers, I’ve built out interactive dashboards for the past 3 seasons here.
And for those that may have missed it, it does look like the TV negotiations are going well, per Puck’s Jon Ourand.
Despite only 3 bids for the NCAA Tournament, the league has never been in a better place to set itself up for financial health.
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