{"id":14018,"date":"2025-05-06T18:52:09","date_gmt":"2025-05-06T18:52:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/14018\/"},"modified":"2025-05-06T18:52:09","modified_gmt":"2025-05-06T18:52:09","slug":"warriors-rockets-finale-is-top-first-round-game-on-cable-since-09","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/14018\/","title":{"rendered":"Warriors-Rockets finale is top first round game on cable since ’09"},"content":{"rendered":"

The final first round NBA playoff game on TNT was the network\u2019s most-watched in 16 years.<\/p>\n

Sunday\u2019s Warriors-Rockets first round NBA playoff Game 7 averaged 6.63 million viewers across TNT and truTV, marking the largest opening round audience on cable since TNT averaged 6.99 million for Bulls-Celtics Game 7 in 2009. (Keep in mind Nielsen did not begin tracking out-of-home viewing in its estimates until 2020.)<\/p>\n

The Warriors\u2019 win delivered the third-largest audience of the postseason thus far, behind Lakers-Timberwolves Game 4 the previous weekend (7.35M) and Magic-Celtics Game 1 on Easter (6.69M), both of which aired on ABC. It should be noted that ABC playoff games are fully exclusive, while first round games on cable co-exist. (Game 7 was the last first round co-exist, as next season all playoff games will be fully exclusive to national TV.)<\/p>\n

The last time Golden State played in an opening round Game 7 two years ago, their matchup against Sacramento averaged a considerably stronger 9.84 million viewers<\/a> \u2014 still the most-watched first round NBA playoff game since 1999 \u2014 but that was an exclusive Sunday afternoon window on ABC.<\/p>\n

The Warriors\u2019 only other opening round Game 7 \u2014 against the Clippers in in 2014 \u2014 averaged just shy of six million on TNT, despite airing in a late night Saturday window (start time close to 11 PM ET). Given out-of-home viewing was not tracked at that time, it is possible that game would rank higher all things being equal.<\/p>\n

As for the weekend\u2019s other Game 7, the Nuggets\u2019 rout of the Clippers averaged 4.21 million on TNT and truTV Saturday night \u2014 down 15% from a Timberwolves-Nuggets second round Game 1 in the same window last year (4.93M). Keep in mind that last year\u2019s game was exclusive to TNT, while this year\u2019s game had to co-exist with local RSN coverage.<\/p>\n

Rounding out the weekend slate, Pacers-Cavaliers Game 1 opened Sunday\u2019s doubleheader with 4.38 million. Both TNT games outdrew the lone ABC window on the same day last year, Magic-Cavaliers Game 7 (4.32M). ABC did not carry any NBA games this weekend, turning over its Sunday schedule to Formula 1. (The F1 race averaged 2.17 million viewers.)<\/p>\n

Going back to the workweek, TNT averaged 4.02 million for Knicks-Pistons and 3.93 for Nuggets-Clippers in a Game 6 doubleheader Thursday night \u2014 up 51% and down 29% respectively from last year\u2019s equivalent doubleheader (Bucks-Pacers: 2.66M; Knicks-Sixers: 5.09M). Friday\u2019s Rockets-Warriors Game 6 averaged 4.61 million on ESPN, up 18% from Clippers-Mavericks last year (3.90M).<\/p>\n

The full first round of the NBA Playoffs averaged 3.27 million viewers across ABC, ESPN, TNT and NBA TV, up 4% from last year. Excluding NBA TV, the average of 3.7 million is up six percent. ESPN\/ABC saw a 14 percent increase (from 3.91 to 4.46M) and TNT a three percent bump (from 3.22 to 3.35M).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The final first round NBA playoff game on TNT was the network\u2019s most-watched in 16 years. Sunday\u2019s Warriors-Rockets…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":14019,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3786],"tags":[7,2520,2522,479,164,4025,4024,2525,6,1278,2530,2531,2532,2533,2534,255,2537],"class_list":{"0":"post-14018","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-golden-state-warriors","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-cavaliers-tv-ratings","10":"tag-clippers-tv-ratings","11":"tag-golden-state","12":"tag-golden-state-warriors","13":"tag-goldenstate","14":"tag-goldenstatewarriors","15":"tag-knicks-tv-ratings","16":"tag-nba","17":"tag-nba-on-tnt","18":"tag-nba-playoff-ratings","19":"tag-nuggets-tv-ratings","20":"tag-pacers-tv-ratings","21":"tag-pistons-tv-ratings","22":"tag-rockets-tv-ratings","23":"tag-warriors","24":"tag-warriors-tv-ratings"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/114462401813648660","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14018","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14018"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14018\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14019"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14018"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14018"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14018"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}