RATINGS CHAMPION FOR THE WEEK : SUPER BOWL PUSHES ABC TO NO. 1 SPOT

As expected, ABC’s Sunday telecast of Super Bowl XIX was the week’s highest-rated network program, with San Francisco’s 38-16 rout of the Miami Dolphins seen in 39.4 million homes, according to A.C. Nielsen Co. ratings made public Tuesday.

However, that was only about 500,000 more homes than watched last year’s Super Bowl battle, and well below the record set in 1983. In that year, viewers in nearly 40.5 million homes saw NBC’s coverage of Super Bowl XVII, in which Washington triumphed over Miami.

Still, ABC’s Sunday telecast of pro football’s highly-hyped annual championship joust helped the network--which appears destined to end this season third in prime-time ratings--emerge No. 1 in last week’s ratings averages.

Its prime-time programs were seen in more than 17 million homes. CBS, usually the leader, finished the week in second place, trailing ABC by about 2.7 million homes. NBC was third, its programs seen in an average of 14 million homes.

However, eight of NBC’s offerings, including the hit “The Cosby Show,” were among last week’s 20 highest-rated shows. CBS and ABC each had six programs in the top 20, ABC’s winners including the network’s post-Super Bowl interviews of winners and losers.

The football fare provided a healthy audience lead-in for the two-hour premiere of ABC’s new cops-and-amour series, “MacGruder and Loud,” heavily advertised during Sunday’s big game.

The series, which made its debut Sunday after the Super Bowl extravaganza, was last week’s seventh highest-rated program, seen in just over 19.3 million homes, according to Nielsen ratings for the week ending Jan. 20. The series moved into its regular slot Tuesday night.

Whether its ratings will stay up there remains to be seen. Last August, ABC also used a top-rated sports event--the Summer Olympics--to heavily promote the two-hour premiere of its new, critically-praised “Call to Glory” series about an Air Force family.

In its first week, and without much new-program competition, “Glory” topped the Nielsen ratings. Its two-hour premiere was seen in nearly 20.8 million homes. But then the series slowly descended in the ratings in its Monday night time period.

Although ABC has stayed with “Glory” and put it in a Tuesday night time slot in hopes it will survive, last week’s Nielsens weren’t heartening at all.

They showed that the series was the week’s lowest-rated prime-time program, seen in about 7.5 million homes.