Louisville of course.

This makes 9 years in a row.





Louisville No. 1 in basketball TV ratings
The Courier-Journal • April 8, 2008

For the ninth year in a row, Louisville ranked as the No. 1 city for March Madness as Louisville had the highest average television rating and share for the run of the NCAA men’s basketball tournament.

In the 56 top markets where Nielson produces overnight ratings statistics, WLKY-TV averaged a 21.6 rating and 36 share.

Second was Memphis with a 16.9 rating and 26 share.

Markets * Rating/Share
1. Louisville 21.0/36
2. Memphis 16.9/26
3. Charlotte 13.4/24
4. Indianapolis 13.0/24
5. Kansas City 12.1/22
6. Cincinnati 11.9/24
7. Columbus, Ohio 11.7/22
7. Greensboro, N.C 11.7/21
7. Nashville 11.7/20
10. Raleigh-Durham 11.4/20

http://www.courier-journal.com/apps/pbcs.../80408025#

Given that the Bucks were in the NIT (which, believe it or not, was actually really fun to watch), I'm kind of surprised that Columbus was so high.

Edit: Good job to Louisville too. May we all be one day as basketball obsessed as you.

How about Cincinnati hanging around in the Top 10 (obviously with Xavier being in the tournament, but imagination if Cincinnati were in the NCAAs)! Looks like the Big East made the right choices with Louisville and Cincinnati! :)

that's what I was thinking CC, BE made right decision with Louv & Cin

CatsClaw Wrote:How about Cincinnati hanging around in the Top 10 (obviously with Xavier being in the tournament, but imagine if Cincinnati were in the NCAAs)!

You have to realize that, at least for the City of Louisville, there isn’t much correlation between “your team” in the tourney and the high ratings.

What I mean is, take these last 9 years that we’ve had the highest ratings; we’ve had 2 NIT teams, 1 team that didn’t even make any post-season play, and also some early round flameouts mixed in there.

Even accounting for the Kentucky fan base here, and also the sprinkling of Indiana fans here and there too, neither of those two programs also have had banner NCAA success the last 9 years.

My point is (at least for our city), it’s just the enormous general passion for the sport of College Basketball the makes the ratings, not necessarily how your team is doing.

......one other note about that list; there is only one city on it (Kansas City) that is west of the Mississippi River.

Championship Game TV Ratings came in...and while the 2 "best" teams took to the floor, its obvious why CBS was cheering for an UCLA vs UNC match-up in the final.
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Kansas' 75-68 overtime win over Memphis on CBS drew a fast national rating of 12.1 and a 20 share, down eight per cent from 2007. Last season's title game, in which Florida beat Ohio State to become the first team in 15 years to repeat as champions, earned a 13.2.

For the Women's Title Game, Tennessee's 64-48 victory over Stanford on ESPN on Tuesday night earned a 3.0 rating, up 30 percent from the 2.3 for last season's Tennessee-Rutgers game.

For the entire women's tournament, games on ESPN averaged a 1.4 rating, compared with 1.0 in 2007. The average rating for games on ESPN2 increased from 0.5 to 0.6.