Black Cable TV Ratings for Week of May 7 - 13
Blacks rise to half the total audience for some NBA Playoff games

(May 17, 2012) As the NBA Playoffs entered the end of the first round last week, the games saw their biggest audiences of the season. The most watched game, The L.A. Lakers' face-off with the Denver Nuggets, took the No.1 spot with 2.3 million black viewers, about 35 percent of that game's total audience.

Black viewers are increasingly important to the NBA for its ratings success. Overall, black viewers were an average of 41 percent of the audience of all the NBA games aired. But some Eastern Conference match-ups, like Boston's battle with Atlanta, saw black households reach above 50 percent of all those watching.

TNT repeated its performance as the week's most watched cable network in black households. It had 17.1 million viewers across 10 games and one pre-game show. BET was second with 4.4 million for four shows.

Nielsen recorded the total audience for the Top 25 at 33.7 million, which is virtually the same as the previous week's total.

Top 25 Cable Shows in Black Households

   Rank | Program | Network | AA Rating | AA Share | Viewers 2+

1	NBA PLAYOFFS- ROUND 1	TNT	12.3	20.1	2,319
2	NBA PLAYOFFS- ROUND 1	TNT	10.2	16.7	1,862
3	NBA PLAYOFFS- ROUND 1	TNT	9.7	15.9	1,815
4	NBA PLAYOFFS- ROUND 1	TNT	9.6	15.4	1,774
5	NBA PLAYOFFS- ROUND 1	TNT	9.6	14.1	1,738
6	NBA PLAYOFFS- ROUND 1	TNT	9.4	14.4	1,843
7	THE GAME	BET	9.4	13.2	1,692
8	NBA PLAYOFFS- ROUND 2	TNT	9.3	15.7	1,606
9	NBA PLAYOFFS- ROUND 1	TNT	8.1	12.3	1,490
10	NBA PLAYOFFS- ROUND 1	TNT	7.9	13.5	1,436
11	NBA PLAYOFFS-1ST RD	ESPN	7.4	11.8	1,246
12	BASKETBALL WIVES 4	VH1	7.4	10.8	1,417
13	BAD GIRLS CLUB	OXYGEN	7.3	10.2	1,545
14	LETS STAY TOGETHER S2	BET	7.0	10.0	1,341
15	LA LAS FULL COURT LIFE 2	VH1	6.7	9.4	1,198
16	NBA PLAYOFFS- ROUND 1	TNT	6.3	9.0	1,091
17	HOUSE OF PAYNE	TBS	5.4	8.6	1,025
18	WWE ENTERTAINMENT	USA	5.2	7.3	1,181
19	HOUSE OF PAYNE	TBS	5.2	8.4	976
20	WWE ENTERTAINMENT	USA	5.1	7.0	1,154
21	NBA PLAYOFFS PRE-GAME	TNT	4.8	7.7	805
22	BASKETBALL WIVES 4	VH1	4.1	5.6	780
23	THE GAME	BET	4.1	5.6	737
24	SHAKE IT UP	DISNEY	3.8	6.0	920
25	BET MOVIE OF THE WEEK	BET	3.7	5.8	709

Source: Nielsen Media Research. Ranked by percent of African-American households watching. Based on live and same day viewing. Number of viewers shown in thousands (1,000 = 1 million). Representing more than 13.45 million television households in the U.S., the African-American television audience is the largest minority segment in Nielsen's measurement samples. All times eastern.

Click here to view the previous week's Top 25 TV shows


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