Fox’s decision to air Big Ten volleyball either before or after its NFL singleheader coverage on Sunday proved to be a beneficial choice for the sport.
Three-quarters of the country saw Wisconsin-Minnesota in the 4 p.m. ET window following an early NFL game, while the other quarter saw Ohio State-Michigan at 1 p.m. ET leading into the late NFL game (Browns-Seahawks) on Fox.
The volleyball window averaged 1.659 million viewers on Fox, a record for college volleyball. A week ago, the Big Ten Network aired a Nebraska-Wisconsin match that averaged 612,000 viewers, topping the Nebraska football game that led into it (560,000 viewers).
As noted by Sports Media Watch, Fox was quite savvy with scheduling for the two matches. In the early singleheader window, Vikings-Packers was a lead-in to the Wisconsin-Minnesota match, while most of Ohio got Ohio State-Michigan as a lead-in to the Browns-Seahawks game. It’s not often that it works out that well, but it clearly did in this case.
In December, ESPN will be giving volleyball some extra love. The NCAA Championship match will be airing on ABC on Sunday, December 17 at 3 p.m. ET. While that’s directly in the middle of an NFL Sunday and won’t benefit from an NFL lead-in on ABC, it’s another example of networks that eschewed college volleyball for years adding matches to higher profile slots on the calendar.
[Data via Sports Media Watch]
