Updated 12/5/23, OTA Games only:

Day of Week Date Time Network Visitor Home Viewers
1 Saturday 11/25/2023 noon FOX Ohio State Michigan 19.07
2 Saturday 12/2/2023 8pm FOX Iowa Michigan 10.02
3 Saturday 10/21/2023 noon FOX Penn State Ohio State 9.96
4 Saturday 11/11/2023 noon FOX Michigan Penn State 9.16
5 Saturday 11/18/2023 noon FOX Michigan Maryland 5.43
6 Saturday 10/28/2023 7:30pm NBC Ohio State Wisconsin 4.87
7 Saturday 9/2/2023 3:30pm CBS Ohio State Indiana 4.65
8 Saturday 10/7/2023 noon FOX Maryland Ohio State 4.51
9 Saturday 9/30/2023 3:30pm FOX Michigan Nebraska 4.48
10 Friday 11/24/2023 noon CBS Iowa Nebraska 4.39
11 Saturday 11/4/2023 noon CBS Ohio State Rutgers 3.98
12 Saturday 10/21/2023 7:30pm NBC Michigan Michigan State 3.73
13 Saturday 11/11/2023 7:30pm NBC Michigan State Ohio State 3.57
14 Saturday 10/14/2023 noon FOX Indiana Michigan 3.55
15 Saturday 9/2/2023 7:30pm NBC West Virginia Penn State 3.5
16 Thursday 8/31/2023 8pm FOX Nebraska Minnesota 3.49
17 Saturday 10/28/2023 noon CBS Indiana Penn State 3.4
18 Friday 11/24/2023 7:30pm NBC Penn State Michigan State 3.38
19 Saturday 9/16/2023 noon FOX Penn State Illinois 3.22
20 Saturday 10/7/2023 7:30pm NBC Michigan Minnesota 3.06
21 Saturday 9/9/2023 3:30pm CBS UNLV Michigan 2.97
22 Saturday 9/16/2023 4pm FOX Western Kentucky Ohio State 2.82
23 Saturday 9/23/2023 7:30pm CBS Iowa Penn State 2.75
24 Sunday 9/3/2023 noon CBS Northwestern Rutgers 2.68
25 Saturday 11/4/2023 7:30pm NBC Purdue Michigan 2.6
26 Saturday 11/18/2023 7:30pm NBC Nebraska Wisconsin 2.45
27 Saturday 11/4/2023 3:30pm FOX Penn State Maryland 2.39
28 Saturday 10/14/2023 4pm FOX Iowa Wisconsin 2.34
29 Saturday 9/30/2023 7:30pm NBC Michigan State Iowa 2.17
30 Saturday 10/21/2023 3:30pm NBC Minnesota Iowa 1.68
31 Saturday 9/16/2023 7:30pm NBC Syracuse Purdue 1.25
32 Saturday 9/23/2023 3:30pm NBC Maryland Michigan State 1.24
33 Saturday 11/11/2023 3:30pm NBC Minnesota Purdue 1.17
34 Saturday 10/14/2023 3:30pm NBC Illinois Maryland 1.14
35 Saturday 9/9/2023 7:30pm NBC Charlotte Maryland 0.665

Last Saturday's Penn State-Ohio State game was the first game all season to top 5 million viewers. No NBC game this year has passed 4 million viewers. On the other hand, fiour Big Ten hosted games won their Saturday time slot this season (Ohio State-Indiana, West Virginia-Penn State, Indiana-Michigan, and of course Penn State-Ohio State).

FOX has done the best this season with the Big Ten, even if you throw Penn State-Ohio State out. They had 3 of the top 4 games and 4 of the top 6 games with only two of their 8 games ranking outside of the top 9 and all in the top 15. CBS currently has the second best game all season with Ohio State-Indiana, their other games all ranked around the middle. NBC has stunk this season, they have the six worst games of the season. Only one game that didn't include a "Big Three" opponent had more viewers than the lowest watched Big Three game (Iowa at Penn State airing opposite Ohio State at Notre Dame, the second most watched game so far this season) and it aired in a special primetime Thursday night slot without much other college football competition on other networks. WESTERN KENTUCKY-Ohio State aired opposite both Georgia and Alabama on Sept. 16 and still got more viewers than the Northwestern-Rutgers game that aired on Sunday afternoon vs. hardly any other competition.

This is my attempt to "even" the score in 2024 between the three networks: https://csnbbs.com/thread-979677.html

OSU/Wisc takes 2nd place. PSU/OSU still is the only Big Ten hosted game to have more than 5 miliion viewers this year.

Indiana/Penn State is now 2nd among CBS's 5 games, making up for Iowa-Penn State which was under 3 million, the lowest watched game involving a Big Three team.

Ohio State/Rutgers doesn't hit 4 million but does win the noon time slot for CBS over Notre Dame/Clemson. Who would have thought that as the season started?

Not good for Penn State/Maryland on FOX. It scored the lowest viewership for a Big Three game this season. Purdue/Michigan meanwhile scored the second lowest viewership for a Big Three game this season. You know you did bad when you get beat by Northwestern/Rutgers. I don't care if it got its own Sunday time slot, it's still Northwestern/Rutgers! You know you did bad when you get beat by WESTERN KENTUCKY/Ohio State. WESTERN KENTUCKY??? How about UNLV?? More people watched UNLV lose to Michigan than Purdue lose to Michigan, what does that say about Purdue??

The only way Michigan/Penn State this Saturday isn't the #2 most watched Big Ten game after this Saturday is if by some chance it's #1 and I highly doubt that will be the case.

Not surprising, Michigan/Penn State is the #2 Big Ten game all season.

Michigan State-Ohio State got a "decent" number, third highest NBC Big 10 game.

Minnesota-Purdue? Yeah, what were they thinking? They did outdrew Rutgers-Iowa and Northwestern-Wisconsin though.

(11-10-2023 09:33 AM)schmolik Wrote:  Ohio State/Rutgers doesn't hit 4 million but does win the noon time slot for CBS over Notre Dame/Clemson. Who would have thought that as the season started?

Who would have thought that game wasn't going to be a blowout, let alone entertaining, when the season started?

Team Road Home Total
Michigan 5 4 9
Ohio State 4 4 8
Penn State 4 4 8
Maryland 2 4 6
Michigan State 2 3 5
Iowa 3 2 5
Minnesota 2 2 4
Nebraska 2 2 4
Wisconsin 0 3 3
Purdue 1 2 3
Indiana 2 1 3
Rutgers 0 2 2
Illinois 1 1 2
Northwestern 1 0 1

With most of the top programs required to play a game on Peacock and all teams required to play two games on BTN, 9 OTA games are the most a school can get on OTA. Michigan maxed out as did Ohio State (the game at Notre Dame was part of Notre Dame's package). Penn State's game with Rutgers aired on FS1. Poor Northwestern got just one OTA game and it was on the road.

Maryland had the 4th most # of games? Problem is they had 3 of the 4 least watched games.

NBC had the most # of games with 15, FOX had 12, CBS had 7. FOX had by far the most viewers, the top four games. NBC had the most duds.