Manning outguns Simon Cowell, too

Manning outguns Simon Cowell, too

	Published : Wed, 24 Jan 2007 02:23 By : Agencies Print this Story

NEW YORK (AFX) - Simon Cowell was impressive; Peyton Manning was even better.

Sunday's gripping AFC championship game between Manning's Indianapolis Colts and the New England Patriots stole some of the thunder from 'American Idol,' even enabling CBS to beat Fox in the ratings for the week, according to Nielsen Media Research.

With 46.7 million viewers, it was the most-watched AFC championship since 1986, and the best in either conference since Dallas took on Green Bay in the January 1996 National Football Conference title game, Nielsen said. The company did not immediately have ratings available for Sunday afternoon's NFC title tilt between the Chicago Bears and New Orleans Saints.

CBS is fortunate enough to have the Super Bowl telecast in two weeks, when Manning takes on the Bears.

Earlier in the week, the sixth edition of 'American Idol' premiered to 37.4 million viewers on Tuesday. Most viewers returned the next night, when the Seattle auditions had 36.9 million viewers.

Much to the chagrin of other networks, the talent show has returned stronger than ever and once again gives Fox the hope it can recover from a very poor start to the TV season.

'For us, spring is the new fall,' said Peter Liguori, Fox entertainment president.

The football game and 'American Idol' dominated the TV landscape so much that the most popular program elsewhere in prime time, 'Grey's Anatomy,' had fewer than 22 million viewers.

For the week, CBS averaged 16.5 million viewers (10.0 rating, 16 share), the biggest weekly audience for any network since the end of the Olympics last year for NBC. Fox averaged 15.2 million viewers (8.7, 13), and won among the coveted 18-to-49-year-old demographic.

NBC had 9.3 million viewers (6.1, 9) ABC 8.8 million (5.7, 9), the CW 2.9 million (1.9, 3) and the i network 650,000 (0.4, 1).

Among the Spanish-language networks, Univision led with 4.2 million viewers (2.2, 3), Telemundo had 920,000 (0.5, 1) and TeleFutura 700,000 (0.4, 1).

NBC's 'Nightly News' won the evening news ratings race, averaging 10.2 million viewers (7.0, 13). ABC's 'World News' had 9.5 million viewers (6.6, 12) and the 'CBS Evening News' 7.8 million (5.5, 10).

A ratings point represents 1,114,000 households, or 1 percent of the nation's estimated 111.4 million TV homes. The share is the percentage of in-use televisions tuned to a given show.

For the week of Jan. 15-21, the top 10 shows, their networks and viewerships: 'AFC Championship Post-Game Show' (10:18 to 10:23 p.m. EST), CBS, 47.7 million; AFC Championship: New England at Indianapolis, CBS, 46.7 million; 'American Idol' (Tuesday), Fox, 37.44 million; 'American Idol' (Wednesday), Fox, 36.94 million; 'AFC Championship Post-Game Show' (10:23 to 10:41 p.m. EST), CBS, 29.39 million; 'Grey's Anatomy,' ABC, 21.94 million; 'CSI: Crime Scene Investigation,' CBS, 21.41 million; 'Golden Globe Awards,' NBC, 20.04 million; 'Desperate Housewives,' ABC, 17.14 million; 'NCIS,' CBS, 15.95 million.

ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Co. CBS is a division of CBS Corp. Fox is a unit of News Corp. NBC and Telemundo are owned by General Electric Co. TeleFutura is a division of Univision. The i network is owned by ION Media Networks.