Well, the National Football League is dominating the ratings once again.
Super Bowl LVI was a smashing success for the league, becoming the most watched show in five years, according to the NFL. The game between the Cincinnati Bengals and the Los Angeles Rams delivered 112.13 million viewers, which includes people tuning in on NBC’s streaming platform Peacock.
“The Super Bowl once again delivered a massive audience, which included NBC and the unmatched power of broadcast television as well as first-ever presentations on Peacock and Telemundo, and led into our most-watched Olympics coverage in four years,” said Mark Lazarus, chairman, NBCUniversal Television and Streaming.
“We’re gratified that our strategy of combining the two most powerful events in the world – the Super Bowl and the Olympics – on ‘Super Gold Sunday’ has paid off in such a big way,” said NBC Sports Chairman Pete Bevacqua. “We look forward to continuing this strategy into the future.”
It’s a massive bounce back for the league, who experienced their lowest Super Bowl numbers in 14 years in 2021.
On Sunday, Rams quarterback Matthew Stafford led the Rams on a 15-play, 79-yard drive, capped off by a one-yard touchdown pass from Stafford to Cooper Kupp with 1:25 left in the fourth quarter to win Super Bowl LVI 23-20.
Without the services of Odell Beckham Jr., forced to exit the game in the second quarter with a knee injury, it was the connection between Stafford and Kupp which gave the Rams their first Super Bowl in Los Angeles.
The Rams force-fed Kupp, getting him five touches on the Super Bowl winning drive.
“That’s hard work,” Stafford said when asked about his connection with Kupp. “That’s hours together … [Sean McVay] kept calling plays for him, kept finding ways to get him the ball. He made unbelievable plays. That’s what he does.”
“Such a great game,” Stafford added.
The entirety of the NFL postseason was filled with down-to-the-wire games. The four divisional playoff games all came down to the final play, and each game averaged 38.2 million viewers., a 21% increase from last season.
The NFL regular season also saw a massive ratings boost, seeing the highest numbers since the 2015 season. The NFL regular season averaged 17.21 million viewers per game, a 10% increase from last season.
“There’s a strong argument to be made that the National Football League is the single most important entity in popular culture. And the numbers of viewers watching the NFL bears that out,” said Marc Ganis, co-founder of Sportscorp.
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Joe Morgan is the Sports Reporter for The Daily Wire. Most recently, Morgan covered the Clippers, Lakers, and the NBA for Sporting News. Send your sports questions to [email protected].
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