Women’s college sports showcased viewership potential last month

The GIST: December was a winning month for sports ratings, with the NFL and NBA both benefiting from holiday downtime and marquee broadcasts. While most women’s pro sports leagues were on the sidelines last month, women’s college sports are quickly proving they can also capitalize on prime December viewership. Snow much potential.

Men’s pro sports: Per usual, NBA Christmas Day games were a slam dunk during the holiday season. The league averaged 5.25M viewers across five games on December 25th, garnering the holiday’s highest viewership since 2019 and an 84% increase YoY, virtually rescuing this NBA season’s ratings.

• It was an even bigger boon for Netflix, which scored the NFL’s Christmas Day games on its platform for the first time. The matchup between the Houston Texans and Baltimore Ravens broke the record for the most-streamed NFL game (24.3M), including a 27M viewership peak during Beyoncé’s halftime performance. A real life boogie.

Women’s college sports: Basketball keeps doing numbers at the college level, with USC’s JuJu Watkins’ and UConn’s Paige Bueckers’ showdown drawing 2.23M average viewers on Fox Sports. It was the second-highest-rated game on the network ever and the most-watched women’s basketball game this season.

• Plus, the 2024 NCAA women’s volleyball tournament — which spanned half of December — was its most-consumed version to date. ESPN viewers watched over 1.3B minutes across the network’s platforms as the tourney saw a 41% viewership boost YoY and 1.3M viewers for the title game between Louisville and Penn State.

Zooming out: In the TV world, viewership typically rises through December to a January peak, which makes perfect sense during the cozy (and usually cold) holiday season. While it may be a slow month for pro women’s sports, the growing audience for women’s college basketball and volleyball shows there’s key marketing potential during the colder months.

• NIL stars like Watkins and Bueckers are not only ideal for headlining matchups, but can also be promoted during the holiday season in connection with holiday spending, such as a new pair of Bose headphones sported by brand athlete Bueckers. Easy buckets.