ESPN, led by holiday NBA and NFL telecasts, was the most-watched cable network in primetime and total day last week.
ESPN averaged 4.7 million viewers for the week of December 25-31, easily besting second place Fox News Channel’s 1 million viewers for the week, according to Nielsen numbers supplied by Fox News. The sports network benefited from a December 30 Dallas Cowboys-Detroit Lions NFL telecast that averaged 11.3 million viewers.
Hallmark Channel finished third with 896,000 viewers, followed by HGTV with 698,000 viewers and MSNBC with 664,000 watchers. Paramount Network was sixth with 621,000 viewers, followed by TBS (604,000 viewers), History (600,000 viewers), and CNN and INSP (tied with 595,000 viewers).
ESPN’s 2 million viewers in total day topped Fox News (911,000 viewers), Hallmark Channel (580,000), MSNBC (537,000) and CNN (451,000), according to Nielsen.
