Last day for analog, big day for NBA Finals ratings in DFW

by Ed Bark of UncleBarky.com

Broadcast stations far and wide are hoping and praying that their ratings won't tumble after analog goes dead at various times Friday.

Hello, and happy/sad Digital Conversion Day. This is the last "Snapshot" under the old regime, with broadcast stations far and wide hoping and praying that their ratings won't tumble after analog goes dead at various times Friday.

The NBA was happy to get in under the wire Thursday with Game 4 of the Lakers-Magic matchup, won in OT by the visitors on Orlando's home floor.

D-FW ratings zoomed during the closing half-hour of a game that stretched through local newscasts and also cut a swath through O'Brien/Letterman before ending at 11:16 p.m. Lakers-Magic drew a king-sized 584,584 viewers during those concluding 30 minutes, all but obliterating the audiences for both CBS' Late Show (93,002 viewers) and NBC's Tonight Show (86,359 viewers).

Overall, ABC's Game 4 averaged 431,795 viewers, with more than half that total -- 236,608 -- in the advertiser-coveted 18-to-49 age range. Had the Magic's Dwight Howard made just one of two free throws at crunch time, we'd be talking about a 2-2 series tie and more ratings riches for ABC. But now Orlando's doomed, whether or not it staves off elimination by winning Sunday night's non-lustrous Game 5.

In Thursday's 7 p.m. hour, NBC's I'm a Celebrity . . . Get Me Out of Here won by default with 172,718 total viewers opposite repeats on Fox and CBS plus pre-game filler on ABC. Opposite the prime-time portion of Game 4, CBS' repeat of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation fared best with 186,004 viewers.

Fox4's 9 p.m. local newscast had the best non-basketball prime-time performance among 18-to-49-year-olds, drawing 87,512 of 'em.

In local news derby results, CBS11 won a downsized three-way 10 p.m. competition in both total viewers and 25-to-54-year-olds, the primary target audience for news programming.

Fox4 nipped both NBC5 and WFAA8 in total viewers at the 6 a.m. hour. But the Peacock prevailed with 25-to-54-year-olds.

WFAA8 notched twin wins at 5 p.m. and NBC5 did likewise at 6 p.m.