The National Football League’s annual Hall of Fame game scored the biggest audience for live sports events over the past week.
The August 3 New York Jets-Cleveland Browns NFL exhibition game on NBC drew 5.97 million viewers to easily top second-place USA Network’s August 6 telecast of the NASCAR Cup Series race, per Nielsen numbers published by Sports Media Watch.
Including those who watched on NBC Sports Digital and Peacock streaming, the Hall of Fame game drew 6.3 million viewers, making it the most-watched telecast of the exhibition game since 2018, according to NBC Sports.
The U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team’s disappointing loss to Sweden in the FIFA Women’s World Cup — which eliminated the Americans from the tournament — on August 6 drew 2.52 million viewers to finish third for the week. Overall, Fox averaged 3.8 million viewers for its four USWNT Women’s World Cup games, up 2% from its four matches in 2019, according to Sports Media Watch.
Also Read: Fox Sports Bullish on Building Women's World Cup Audience Over Final Rounds
NASCAR auto-racing events occupied three of the top 10 slots, while CBS’s coverage of the PGA Tour Wyndham Championship secured two top 10 finishes.
Falling just outside of the top 10 was NBC's August 6 replay of Simone Biles’s performance at the U.S. Classic gymnastics competition, which drew 1.05 million viewers, well as ESPN's August 5 UFC Fight Night telecast, which drew 1.03 million viewers.
