Rah! Rah! ABC wins ratings duel due to college football

NEW YORK (AP) — The opening of college football’s season was welcome news for ABC in an otherwise quiet week for television.

The network won the weekly ratings competition on the strength of games that took over the network’s schedule on Saturday night (Oregon vs. Auburn) and Sunday (Oklahoma vs. Houston), the Nielsen company said.

As it approaches its end for the season, NBC’s “America’s Got Talent” otherwise dominated the prime-time landscape, with the week’s two most popular programs.

ABC averaged 3.7 million viewers in prime time for the week. NBC was second with 3.43 million viewers, CBS had 3.35 million, Fox had 1.5 million, ION Television had 1.3 million, Univision had 1.03 million, Telemundo had 1.01 million and the CW had 580,000.

Fox News Channel was the week’s most popular cable network, averaging 2.29 million viewers in prime time. MSNBC had 1.53 million, ESPN had 1.39 million, HGTV had 1.21 million and USA had 1.12 million.

ABC’s “World News Tonight” topped the evening newscasts with an average of 8.2 million viewers. NBC’s “Nightly News” was second with 7.3 million and the “CBS Evening News” had 5.1 million.

For the week of Aug. 26-Sept. 1, the top 10 shows, their networks and viewerships: “America’s Got Talent” (Tuesday), NBC, 8.99 million; “America’s Got Talent” (Wednesday), NBC, 8 million; College Football: Oregon vs. Auburn, ABC, 6.86 million; “60 Minutes,” CBS, 6.24 million; College Football: Oklahoma vs. Houston, ABC, 5.44 million; “NCIS,” CBS, 5.11 million; “American Ninja Warrior,” NBC, 4.87 million; “Bachelor in Paradise” (Monday), ABC, 4.59 million; “FBI,” CBS, 4.47 million; “Big Brother” (Wednesday), CBS, 4.29 million.