Thursday Sweet 16 games up big on TBS, down big on CBS
hursday’s Kansas State-Michigan State NCAA men’s basketball regional semifinal averaged 5.92 million viewers on TBS, up 88% from Villanova-Michigan last year (3.15M) and the largest Sweet 16 audience on the network — excluding two years ago, when the games aired in standalone weekend windows — since 2015 (Wisconsin-North Carolina: 6.89M). (As with all multi-year highs, keep in mind out-of-home viewing was not included in viewership prior to two years ago.)
CBS led the way in the late window with 6.13 million for Gonzaga’s thrilling win over UCLA, but that was still down 25% from Duke’s narrow win over Texas Tech last year (8.23M). In the same window on TBS, Florida Atlantic’s upset of Tennessee drew 3.97 million — up 68% from Houston-Arizona a year ago (2.36M).