SEC boasts 7 of 10 most-watched teams in college football so far

The viewership story of the college football season thus far is the dominance of the SEC on ABC.

Through eight weeks, ABC has won 20 of 24 total national Saturday windows (noon ET, 3:30 p.m. ET, and primetime), with Fox’s Big Noon Saturday the only other network on the board, winning the noon timeslot four times in eight weeks.

The story was no different last weekend, with ABC sweeping all three windows and securing the three most-watched games of Week 8.

Week 8 most-watched CFB games, per Nielsen.

Ole Miss-UGA (ABC) 9.8M
Tenn-Bama (ABC) 8.0M
LSU-Vandy (ABC) 5.9M
USC-ND (NBC) 4.6M
Wash-Mich (FOX) 4.3M
Ohio St-Wis (CBS) 4M

Lou-Miami (ESPN) 3.4M
Neb-Minn (FOX) 2.7M
Texas-UK (ESPN) 2.64M
T Tech-ASU (FOX) 2.56M
Utah-BYU (FOX) 2.M

— Stewart Mandel (@slmandel) October 22, 2025

Dominance for ABC also means dominance for the SEC, which boasts seven of the 10 most-watched schools in college football through Week 8. On Thursday, Nielsen published its mid-season top-10 list, with SEC teams gobbling up the first six spots.

In order, the most-watched teams in college football so far this season are:

1. Alabama (7.92 million viewers)
2. Tennessee (7.80 million)
3. Georgia (7.60 million)
4. Texas (6.88 million)
5. Oklahoma (6.29 million)
6. LSU (6.14 million)
7. Ohio State (6.11 million)
8. Miami (FL) (5.60 million)
9. Florida (5.15 million)
10. Notre Dame (5.00 million)

By conference, the SEC has seven of 10, while the Big Ten, ACC, and independent Notre Dame fill out the final three slots with one each.

The SEC dominance paints a strong picture for ABC and ESPN, which is now in Year 2 of a 10-year pact with the conference that runs through 2034. ABC has had massive success with its tripleheaders of SEC games each Saturday, with each game able to draw from the audience tuning in to the others. Conversely, the Big Ten has deployed an NFL-like model in which fans must switch between Fox, CBS, and NBC to watch each game.

Of course, there’s other factors likely involved. The depth of the SEC compared to other conferences may play a role. Along those lines, the depth of brands is likely a significant factor, too. The SEC has blue-blood programs like Alabama, Georgia, Texas, LSU, etc., that fans will tune in for regardless of quality. The Big Ten only has a couple of such schools in Ohio State and Michigan.

Given the price ESPN is paying for its SEC package (approximately $710 million per year) compared to the combined price Fox, CBS, and NBC are paying for the Big Ten ($1.15 billion per year), the Worldwide Leader has to feel pretty good about its decisions so far.