Giants Win Over 49ers Marks Highest NFL Conference Title Rating Since 1995
The New York Giants’ 20-17 overtime win over the San Francisco 49ers drew the best preliminary television rating for any National Football League conference championship game since 1995.
The New England Patriots’ 23-20 win over the Baltimore Ravens, which also was decided in the closing seconds, had the highest rating for an afternoon American Football Conference championship since 1994.
Yesterday’s Giants-49ers National Football Conference title game at Candlestick Park in San Francisco was seen on Fox in 33.4 percent of homes in the top 56 U.S. television markets, Ileana Pena, a spokeswoman for the News Corp. (NWSA) network, said in an e-mail.
That makes it the highest-rated conference title game since the 49ers beat the Dallas Cowboys 38-28 in January 1995, which drew a major-market rating of 34.2.
The Giants’ victory drew an 11 percent better rating than last year’s NFC championship between the Green Bay Packers and Chicago Bears, which earned a 30 rating while airing earlier in the day.
New York topped the 49ers 7:54 into overtime on a 31-yard field goal by Lawrence Tynes. The kick came after the Giants recovered a fumbled punt by Kyle Williams at the 49ers’ 24-yard- line.
The Patriots’ 23-20 win over the Ravens earned a 29.1 major-market rating on CBS. That’s the highest such rating for an afternoon AFC championship since a 1994 meeting between the Kansas City Chiefs and Buffalo Bills that drew a 29.5, according to CBS Corp.
Patriots Win
The Patriots won yesterday’s game after Baltimore kicker Billy Cundiff missed a 32-yard field goal with 11 seconds left.
The Giants and Patriots will meet in the Feb. 5 Super Bowl in a rematch of the 2008 title game, which New York won 17-14. Last year’s Super Bowl, won by the Packers over the Pittsburgh Steelers, was the most-watched program in U.S. television history, drawing an average of 111 million viewers.
The 2008 Super Bowl drew an average of 97 million viewers - - at the time a record for the event -- and a 43.1 rating, according to Nielsen Holdings NV.
To contact the reporter on this story: Mason Levinson in New York at mlevinson@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Michael Sillup at msillup@bloomberg.net.