DISNEY - ESPN SETS NEW CABLE RATINGS RECORD

ESPN SETS NEW CABLE RATINGS RECORD

ESPN's Monday Night Football is the new champ of cable TV. Monday night's telecast of the New England Patriots-Baltimore Ravens game averaged a record 17.5 million viewers, according to Nielsen Media Research. The figure was 300,000 higher than the audience for the previous cable ratings champ, Disney Channel's High School Musical 2, which averaged 17.2 million viewers on August 17. Monday's game peaked in the final half hour with 23.87 million viewers tuning in to see the Patriots win by a score of 27-24. The 1993 debate between Al Gore and Ross Perot carried on CNN's Larry King Live scored higher ratings, but a far smaller audience (11.2 million), since it aired at a time when cable had lower penetration in U.S. households.

06/12/2007