The first year of the NBA’s media rights deal continues to deliver large amounts of viewers.
San Antonio’s 122-115 double overtime victory over Oklahoma City on Monday night was the most-watched Western Conference Game 1 final in league history, averaging 9.2 million viewers on NBC and Peacock, according to Nielsen and Adobe Analytics.
The audience peaked at 12 million for the second overtime and game’s conclusion. It was also the most-viewed television program of the night with 6.9 million on NBC.
Monday night’s game was the second-most watched of this year’s playoffs. Game 7 of the first-round series between Philadelphia and Boston on May 2 averaged 11 million on NBC/Peacock.
It is a strong start to the conference finals after the first two rounds averaged 4.5 million per game across ABC, ESPN, NBC/Peacock and Amazon Prime Video. That is the highest average since 1997, and a 16% increase over last year.
A significant reason for the viewer increase is the amount of games available on network TV. With NBC airing games for the first time since 2002 and the NBA on two networks for the first time, there were 28 first- and second-round games on NBC and ABC. NBC had most of them with 21 and is averaging 5.8 million viewers.
Last year, ABC had 10 games for the two rounds.
Some of the increase can be also attributed to a change in the way viewers are counted. Nielsen began using its Big Data + Panel methodology for all events last September with the start of the current television season. Also last year, Nielsen began measuring out-of-home viewers for all states but Hawaii and Alaska, along with including data from smart TVs along with cable and satellite set-top boxes.
The first two rounds had 23 games average at least 5 million viewers, the most since there were 25 in 2011.
Sunday night’s Game 7 between the Cleveland Cavaliers and Detroit Pistons was the most-watched sports event of last week, averaging 6.53 million on Amazon Prime Video. It is the first time Prime Video has had the top spot on Nielsen’s weekly sports rating events report.
Prime Video just concluded its first season of carrying NBA games after taking over for TNT.
The playoffs have also accounted for 17 of the top 20 most-viewed sports telecasts since May 1.
Viewer numbers for Game 1 of the Eastern Conference finals between the Cleveland Cavaliers and New York Knicks on ESPN are likely to be available on Thursday. The Knicks rallied from a 22-point deficit in the fourth quarter to win in overtime 115-104.
This will also be the first time an entire conference final will be on network television. NBC has the entire Western Conference series, while most of the Eastern Conference final is on ESPN. Saturday’s Game 3 will be on ABC.
