Well for those who may have been surprised despite the intensive media blitz and being on the major CTV network versus the smaller TSN, the combined Grey Cup numbers outdrew the SC 3.65M to 3.6M.
Here is the evidence.
Small audience tunes in to Grey Cup Game
2.439 million people who tuned in was the Cup's second-worst TV audience since 1989
Article Comments (30) WILLIAM HOUSTON
From Tuesday's Globe and Mail
E-mail William Houston | Read Bio | Latest Columns
November 24, 2008 at 11:30 PM EST
TSN's first Grey Cup telecast drew one of the lowest television audiences in the history of the CFL championship game.
The 2.439 million people who watched the Calgary Stampeders' win over the Montreal Alouettes is the Cup's second-worst TV audience since 1989.
It was down 27 per cent from the CBC's 3.337 million a year ago for Winnipeg Blue Bombers-Saskatchewan Roughriders.
The only audience worse was the CBC's 1.628 million for a Blue Bomber rout of the Edmonton Eskimos in 1990.
TSN faced several challenges.
Calgary-Montreal was not a great matchup for English-language television.
The game was dull.
TSN's playoff audience results, leading up to the game, were poor.
Audiences for the division semi-finals and finals were down significantly, because the games aired on Saturday rather than Sunday, and the two southern Ontario teams were not involved.
And TSN, a cable channel, couldn't match the broadcast distribution of the CBC, which is available in 13 million households compared with TSN's nine million.
The audience, though poor by Grey Cup standards, was substantial for TSN. But it wasn't close to a record.
The network has drawn more than three million for several world junior hockey championship gold-medal games.
The good news for TSN was viewership on RDS, its French language companion channel.
The RDS telecast was watched by 1.215 million, a Grey Cup record for the network. Viewers tuned in because the Als were playing. There was also the factor of hometown pride. The game was played in Montreal.
Taken together, the TSN-RDS audience, the total Canadian viewership, was 3.615 million, slightly more than the combined CBC-RDS audience of 3.539 million in 2007.
Last year, RDS drew only 200,000 for Bombers-Roughriders.
TSN president Phil King attributed the weak audience in English Canada to the participation of the Alouettes, which have a strong following in Quebec, but less so in the rest of the country.
He said he was pleased with the overall result because English-French language viewership together surpassed last year's total.
"We're happy," he said. "The total audience is up. It doesn't really matter from TSN's point of view what the mix is."
Still, the TSN audience is not good news for the CFL, which chose TSN over the CBC in a five-year rights agreement that started this year.
The audience figure could affect TSN's advertising rates for the 2009 Grey Cup.
The CFL won't be touched in the short term. Its rights fees are guaranteed. However, if Grey Cup audiences stay at this level over the next four years, the league will have difficulty maintaining the present rights fee of about $16-million for regular season and playoff games plus the Grey Cup in the next negotiation.
Despite the low audience, sports TV executives yesterday praised the quality of the telecast.
"I thought they did a very good job of production," one said. "The director, Paul Hemming, did a great job."
One criticism was TSN ending the postgame coverage at 9:30 p.m. Last year, the CBC stayed past 10 p.m. and provided locker room interviews.
Super Bowl ratings down in Canada
Article Comments WILLIAM HOUSTON
From Tuesday's Globe and Mail
E-mail William Houston | Read Bio | Latest Columns
February 2, 2009 at 9:29 PM EST
The Super Bowl on Sunday was hyped as an instant classic because of the record 100-yard interception return, a rally by the Arizona Cardinals and a victory in the final seconds by the Pittsburgh Steelers.
But the drama didn't produce big audience numbers on Canadian television. The game was watched by 3.602 million on CTV, a decrease of 14 per cent from last year's 4.2 million.
In contrast, in the United States, NBC's average audience for the Super Bowl was 95.4 million. That ranks second overall for Super Bowls, behind only last year's 97.4 million. NBC's overnight rating (the percentage of potential U.S. households tuned in) was 42.1. Last year's overnight was 44.7.
The Canadian audience also fell short of TSN's 3.684 million for the gold-medal game (Canada-Sweden) of the junior hockey championship last month.
The Super Bowl easily outdrew the 2008 Grey Cup (Calgary Stampeders-Montreal Alouettes) on TSN. That game was watched by only 2.439 million viewers, one of the smallest audiences ever for the CFL championship game. But it didn't surpass by much the CBC's 2007 Grey Cup (Winnipeg Blue Bombers-Saskatchewan Roughriders) audience of 3.337 million.