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Ratings winner Game 5 of Stanley Cup finals earns big audience for ABC
Posted: Friday June 09, 2000 03:15 PM
NEW YORK (AP) -- The NHL finally produced a major-league ratings number for ABC. The Dallas Stars' 1-0 victory over the New Jersey Devils in triple overtime in Game 5 of the Stanley Cup finals, which ended at 1:13 a.m. EDT Friday, earned a 5.3 overnight rating and a 10 share, Nielsen Media Research reported. That represents an increase of 47 percent over the 3.6 overnight rating that Fox earned for its coverage of last year's Game 5 of the finals. It also appears to be the highest overnight rating for a hockey game since the early 1970s, the sport's television heyday. Each rating point represents 1 percent of the country's TV households, and overnight numbers are based on a reading of the largest markets. Friday, Nielsen estimates there are 100.8 million TV homes; in the 1970-71 season, that figure was only 60.1 million. The share is the percentage of in-use televisions that are tuned to a given program. Fox's top overnight rating during its five-year deal with the NHL was the 5.0 for Game 1 of the 1997 Stanley Cup finals between the Detroit Red Wings and Philadelphia Flyers. Mike Modano's goal 6:21 into the third overtime pulled Dallas within 3-2 in the best-of-seven series. ABC will show Game 6 on Saturday night, with Game 7, if necessary, on Monday. It was the fourth-longest Stanley Cup finals game ever and, early in the third overtime, became the longest scoreless finals game. The rating is a boost for the network, which had averaged 2.8 nationally for its broadcasts of Games 3 and 4 (ESPN showed the first two games of the finals). That represented an 18 percent decline from the 3.4 Fox averaged for its first two Stanley Cup finals broadcasts in 1999. The numbers also probably make ABC feel a bit better about pulling its ratings bonanza "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire" off Thursday night's schedule because of the game's 8:00 p.m. EDT start time. The Walt Disney Co., which owns ABC and the ESPN networks, anted up $600 million in August for a five-year deal with the NHL. ABC's broadcast rights are costing about double what Fox's did.
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