USA Network Makes It a Perfect 10

USA Network last week notched its 10th consecutive prime-time ratings win, averaging 3.06 million total viewers and sweeping the three top demos.According to Nielsen live-plus-same-day ratings data for the week ended March 8, USA delivered 1.47 million adults 25-54, 1.38 million viewers 18-49 and 640,000 viewers 18-34. Even with Monk and Psych on hiatus, USA managed to secure six of the top 10 most-watched programs on ad-supported cable last week, as Burn Notice lured 6.09 million viewers Thursday night at 10 p.m. and WWE Raw averaged 5.51 million viewers Monday night between 9 p.m. and 11:10 p.m. Three episodes of NCIS also landed in the upper reaches, including USA’s Monday fringe (7 p.m.) telecast, which averaged 4.68 million viewers.Burn Notice and WWE Raw also accounted for the top two programs among the 18-49 and 25-54 demos.Fox News Channel jumped into second palce on the week, averaging 2.39 million viewers, 546,000 of which were members of the core 25-54 demo. FNC racked up its largest programming delivery with Thursday night’s installment of The O’Reilly Factor, which drew 3.95 million viewers in its 8 p.m. slot. TBS moved up to third place with 1.82 million viewers, on the way to taking the silver among all three demos. TBS put up its best demo delivery with the 18-49 set, averaging 11.08 million.Thanks in part to a new episode of iCarly, which drew a staggering 6.3 million viewers Saturday night at 8 p.m. (making it the most-watched show on ad-supported cable last week), Nickelodeon/Nick-at-Nite inched up a spot to fourth place with 1.71 million viewers. Predictably enough, iCarly also put up big numbers among its core demos, averaging 2.8 million kids 6-11, 2.4 million ‘tweens 9-14 and 3.5 million kids 2-11. In the lead-out, True Jackson, VP, retained 70 percent of the iCarly audience, serving up 4.41 million viewers.ESPN closed out the top five with 1.63 million viewers, drawing its largest crowd of the week with its Sunday night coverage of the World Baseball Classic. Some 2.65 million fans tuned in to watch Team USA lay waste to Venezuela’s bullpen on the way to a 15-6 blowout.Notably absent among the upper echelon was TNT, which fell to seventh place on the first week after The Closer went on hiatus until this summer. Monday’s repeat episode was TNT’s biggest catch, averaging 2.96 million viewers, leading into a new episode of Saving Grace (2.5 million). Meanwhile, TNT’s latest original series, the ad-agency hybrid Trust Me, continued to falter in its new Tuesday 10 p.m. slot, averaging 1.05 million viewers on March 3. That represents a drop of 69 percent since the show debuted to 3.4 million viewers on Jan. 26. Disney Channel moved up to third place among all basic-cable nets last week, as the non-ad-supported net averaged 2.1 million total viewers. The Mouse fared particularly well on Sunday night, scaring up 4.25 million viewers at 7:30 p.m. with a new installment of Hannah Montana. A new episode of the Demi Lovato vehicle Sonny With a Chance retained 91 percent of its Miley lead-in, delivering 3.87 million viewers in the 8 p.m. slot.

Convergent TV

USA Network Makes It a Perfect 10

Anthony Crupi

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Anthony Crupi