Now that bowl season has nearly wrapped up, we can look at the TV ratings with some perspective, and the inaugural St. Petersburg Bowl, featuring USF and Memphis, drew the third-lowest ratings out of 22 bowls broadcast on ESPN and ESPN2.
The St. Pete game drew a 1.3 rating, which equates to 1,262,000 households, according to ESPN. Again, an afternoon slot on the first day of bowl season isn't supposed to get huge ratings -- the two bowls with lower ratings were both in prime time -- the Independence Bowl on Dec. 28 (Northern Illinois-Louisiana Tech) got a 1.0 rating, and the Dec. 21 New Orleans Bowl (Troy-Southern Miss) got a 0.8.
Of the other three games played on Dec. 20, the New Mexico Bowl got a 2.6, the Las Vegas Bowl got a 2.5 and the EagleBank Bowl got a 2.2. For more comparison, this year's USF-Kansas game in September got a 2.0 rating ...
Game update: USF leads Louisville 10-7, with a ton of blocked shots already -- a SportsCenter worthy one from Dominique Jones and at least two from Gus Gilchrist, who has five points already. Oh, and Alex Rivas Sanchez got a haircut ...
Times sportswriter Greg Auman, who covers USF, will post news and thoughts on the Bulletin and we invite your participation in the comments area.
Oh boy! If they have problems after just one year
Posted by: http://www.extremejohn.com | January 14, 2009 at 12:59 PM
Hey Al - They may have watched UCF, but I doubt they were cheering for them.
Posted by: | January 08, 2009 at 02:10 PM
1,262,000 more viewers than in the audience who watched UCF in their 2008 bowl game.
Posted by: Al | January 08, 2009 at 01:59 PM
"You silly USFidiots drive me crazy!"
Posted by: Chalko | January 07, 2009 at 07:57 PM
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No driving involved...just a shot putt!
Posted by: Al | January 08, 2009 at 01:56 PM
It didnt help that USF was playing on ESPN2 instead of ESPN. Also, it didnt help that Memphis basketball was playing on ESPN against Syracuse.
Posted by: Bull Daly | January 08, 2009 at 01:17 PM
There should have been at least 33,468 more people watching on tv since the "fans" stayed away in droves! LOL
Posted by: Crickets | January 07, 2009 at 11:15 PM
Most people who watch bowl games (but did not go to either school) want to be entertained by watching a good game... Unfortunately this was not a good match up... I think, had we played an ACC team there would have been more interest....
And I can honestly say, there wasn't any promotion of this game by ESPN....
Posted by: bulliever | January 07, 2009 at 11:15 PM
I don't think those stats are that bad, considering. Over a million people watched the game, and ESPN got some pretty cheap programming.
Posted by: Ken | January 07, 2009 at 09:55 PM
So wait a minute.... What you're trying to say David is that the nation doesn't care about USF??? I don't get it! I though USF was a national power and had fans worldwide!?!?? You silly USFidiots drive me crazy!
Posted by: Chalko | January 07, 2009 at 07:57 PM
Greg,
You should post game updates as frequently as possible to bump the USF-FSU thread (or, rather, what it's turned into) off the front page!
As for the actual b-ball game, this team just withers out there without a center. At least Howard and Gilchrist are keeping up their progress from last game so far.
Posted by: JT (Atlanta) | January 07, 2009 at 07:37 PM
That sounds about right. Not sure why someone not affiliated with the schools would care about the game. The non-affiliated people probably just had some free time.
Posted by: David Weber | January 07, 2009 at 07:32 PM