TV Ratings : Olympic Gold Rubs Off on NBC

The Summer Olympics came out of the starting blocks with a bang for NBC. The A.C. Nielsen Co. reported Tuesday that the first night of sports coverage on Sunday attracted more viewers than any other program last week and helped propel NBC to its first win since the week of June 8. The opening ceremonies on Saturday also did well, placing No. 4 among the week’s 87 prime-time programs. NBC said that Sunday’s ratings represented a 16% increase over the first night of Olympics coverage in 1988, and network researchers estimated that more than 74 million people watched at least part of the telecast. CBS finished second for the week with a 9.4 rating, compared to 11 for NBC, 8.4 for ABC and 6.8 for Fox.

* The debut of the ABC action show “Human Target” on July 20 was anything but spectacular--it ranked No. 53 for the week, with about 6.6 million homes tuning in--but that looked great compared to what happened when it moved into its regular time slot last Saturday. Pitted against NBC’s coverage of the opening ceremonies of the Olympics, the show plummeted to No. 82, with 4.5 million households tuning in.

Points Share 1. “Olympics (Sunday)” (NBC) 18.1 33 2. “Roseanne” (ABC) 15.0 26 3. “Home Improvement” (ABC) 14.2 26 4. “Olympics (Saturday)” (NBC) 13.8 29 5. “Murphy Brown” (CBS) 12.5 22 “Conspiracy of Silence” (CBS) 12.5 21 * “Human Target” (ABC) 4.9 10

(Each rating point represents 921,000 homes. Share is the percentage of viewing audience.)

Complete list, F10