ESPN Networks Top College Football Week 10 with Six of the Top 10 Most-Viewed Games - Alabama-LSU Overtime Thriller Delivers 7.6 Million Viewers
ESPN networks won the noon, primetime and late night windows on Saturday and scored six of the top 10 most-viewed matchups of college football's Week 10. This was the most-watched week of college football on ESPN in six years (since 2016's Week 12), and ESPN networks remain on pace for their most-watched season since 2017.
LSU's overtime upset of Alabama on ESPN (7 p.m. ET) delivered 7.6 million viewers and peaked with 10.4 million viewers, becoming ESPN's most-watched regular season college football game since 2016 (Ole Miss/Florida State, 8.4 million viewers) and the most-watched regular season Saturday college football game since 2015, when Ole Miss/Alabama brought in an audience of 7.6 million. The Tigers/Tide tussle ranks as the sixth-best Saturday ESPN game in network history and sixth-best game on any network this season. The primetime presentation is ESPN's most-watched non-NFL telecast since Game 7 of the NBA Eastern Conference Finals in May and second most-watched since the 2022 College Football Playoff National Championship.
ABC's presentation of Ohio State at Northwestern won the noon window Saturday with 4.8 million viewers - ABC's best noon game of the season. Other Week 10 window standouts include Florida at Texas A&M (2.7M | ESPN, noon, second best game at noon across all networks) and California at USC (2.0M | ESPN, 11:15p), both ranking among the best games in their respective windows this season.
In all, college football's upsets, high-octane matchups and rivalries from Week 10 made Saturday, Nov. 5 the most-consumed Saturday of college football across all networks this year (based on minutes watched).
College GameDay Hits a Viewership High Between the Hedges
College GameDay Built by The Home Depot's visit to Athens is the show's second-best audience of the season, scoring 2.24 million viewers and nearly 3 million viewers in the show's final hour. The audience is up 22% year-over-year (2021 Week 10: Cincinnati), and the prelude to the Game of the Century is one of the top 10 most-watched episodes of the show since it expanded to three hours in 2013. Through 10 weeks, College GameDay is off to its best 10-week start ever and is up double digits among P2+ and P18-49 viewers.
ESPN'S MOST-VIEWED GAMES OF WEEK 10
Top-10 Rank* Time Matchup Viewership Network
2 Primetime Alabama (31) at LSU (32) - OT 7.6 million ESPN
3 Noon Ohio State (21) at Northwestern (7) 4.8 million ABC
5 Noon Florida (41) at Texas A&M (24) 2.7 million ESPN
7 Afternoon Penn State (45) at Indiana (14) 2.2 million ABC
8 Late Night California (35) at USC (41) 2.0 million ESPN
9 Primetime Florida State (45) at Miami (3) 1.5 million ABC
* Among college football games across all networks in Week 10
Local Markets Locked in for Week 10
Alabama at LSU, ESPN
Market Rating
Birmingham 39.2
New Orleans 24.7
Knoxville 10.5
Atlanta 9.5
Nashville 9.4
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