NBC’s ‘Today’ regains ratings lead in key demographic

For the second time in the 2-week-old season, viewership for the NFL’s two prime-time games on broadcast television was lower than one year ago but still finished atop the ratings.

NBC’s “Sunday Night Football” game between the Green Bay Packers and Minnesota Vikings was the most-watched prime-time program between Sept. 12 and Sunday, averaging 22.75 million viewers, according to live-plus-same-day figures released by Nielsen on Tuesday.

Viewership was 13.8% lower than the 26.38 million average for the second “Sunday Night Football” game of 2015, which matched the Packers and Seattle Seahawks and had the largest audience for a Week 2 NFL prime-time game since 1991.

CBS’ “Thursday Night Football” game between the Buffalo Bills and New York Jets was third for the week, averaging 15.39 million viewers, 27.1% less than the 21.12 million average for the 2015 “Thursday Night Football” game between the Denver Broncos and Kansas City Chiefs.

NBC had four of the week’s five most-watched programs, helping it finish first in the network race for the 11th time in 12 weeks, averaging 8.73 million viewers. CBS was second, averaging 7.55 million, followed by ABC, which averaged 5.11 million.

Fox averaged 2.76 million viewers to finish fourth among the major broadcast networks for the 23rd consecutive week. Fox was fifth overall, trailing ESPN, the most-watched cable network, averaging 3.24 million

In addition to the 1-2 finish by “Sunday Night Football” and its 11-minute kickoff show, NBC also had the week’s two most-watched non-football programs, the Wednesday and Tuesday editions of “America’s Got Talent,” which were fourth and fifth for the week, averaging 14.41 million and 13.97 million.

An “America’s Got Talent” episode was the most-watched entertainment program all 14 weeks it aired this summer.

CBS received a second boost from the NFL through the 44-minute runover of its Sunday afternoon coverage into prime time, which averaged 24.6 million viewers. The runover is not considered a separate program but is included in the weekly average.

CBS’ Sunday programming accounted for two of the week’s 11 most-watched programs — the news magazine “60 Minutes,” seventh for the week, averaging 12.7 million and Part 1 of the two-part documentary “The Case of: JonBenet Ramsey,” 11th for the week, averaging 10.42 million.

ABC’s coverage of Sunday’s Primetime Emmy Awards drew its smallest audience since individual viewership figures began being released on an annual basis in 1982, 11.38 million, 10th for the week and fifth among non-football programs.

The previous low was 11.87 million for the 2015 ceremony, which aired on Fox and had the benefit of following an NFL game.

The record-low Emmy viewership continues a pattern of dropping viewership for awards shows. Viewership for ABC’s Oscars telecast in February was the smallest since 2008. Viewership for CBS’ coverage of the Grammys earlier in February was the lowest since 2009.

The week’s most-watched cable program was the opener of ESPN’s “Monday Night Football” doubleheader Sept. 12 between the Pittsburgh Steelers and Washington, which averaged 12.96 million, sixth overall.

The second game of the doubleheader between the Rams and San Francisco 49ers was second for the week among cable programs and 12th overall, averaging 10.25 million.