Football fuels Fox to Sunday victory

The NY Giants' overtime victory inside the San Francisco Bay Area 49ers in football's NFC Championship game acquired monster ratings for Fox on Sunday -- drawing greater than four occasions the combined youthful-adult viewership of ABC, CBS and NBC. ABC's ''Once Upon a Time'' was the most effective-rated series, lower merely a tick from the other day. Reliable preliminary Nielsen estimations for your NFC Championship won't be accessible until later today, but Fox's stations averaged an 18.7 rating/40 participate grownups 18-49 and 50.millions of audiences overall for your full quantity of primetime Sunday. These amounts are needed to build up nicely inside the excellent because they do not precisely reflect West Coast viewing, and the sport started around 6:40 p.m. ET. The web than adopted at 10:57 p.m. ET getting a unique ''American Idol,'' which came a 7.9 demo rating and 19.8 million audiences, according to time zone-modified preliminary Nielsen amounts bought by Fox the web had wanted to acquire ''Idol,'' round the air earlier, nevertheless the late football finish resulted without anyone's knowledge music series ended up airing from primetime in much of the united states for essentially its initial few minutes. Earlier inside the day on CBS, the network's coverage in the AFC Championship involving the Gambling and Baltimore Ravens came a 29.1 household rating/51 participate Nielsen's metered-market overnights -- the most effective score with an mid-day AFC title game in 18 years game peaked getting a 34.9/56 within the final a quarter-hour. In primetime, the web broadcast ''60 Minutes'' (1.5/3 in 18-49, 7.9 million audiences overall), then ''Undercover Boss'' (2.2/5 in 18-49, 9.2 million audiences overall) and repeats of ''The Good Wife'' (1.1/2 in 18-49, 5.6 000 0000 audiences overall) and ''CSI: Miami'' (1.4/3 in 18-49, 6.2 million audiences overall). ''Boss'' was lower significantly from the other day if the didn't face football. ABC associated with its regular selection, opening with ''America's Funniest Home Videos'' (1.2/3 in 18-49, 5.2 million audiences overall) after which it surging at 8 p.m. with ''Once Upon a Time'' (3.2/7 in 18-49, 9.3 million audiences overall), which while low quality, was only slightly taken off the other day if the faced only the concluding 10 mins of football. Also in the tick was ''Desperate Housewives'' (2.6/5 in 18-49, 7.5 million audiences overall), and ''Pan Am'' closed the evening (1.3/3 in 18-49, 3.9 million audiences overall) up slightly from the other day. NBC broadcast a couple-hour ''Dateline'' (1.1/2 in 18-49, 5.2 million audiences overall) then two special original cases of the canceled cop drama ''Prime Suspect'' (.8/2 in 18-49, 4.3 million audiences overall at 9 and .7/2 in 18-49, 3.6 000 0000 audiences overall at 10). Preliminary 18-49 earnings for your evening: Fox, 18.7/40 ABC, 2./4 CBS, 1.6/3 NBC, .9/2 Univision, .8/2. In general audiences: Fox, 50.millions of CBS, 7.2 million ABC, 6.4 million NBC, 4.6 000 0000 Univision, 2.5 million. Contact Ron Kissell at ron.kissell@variety.com