NCIS ratings for Oct. 22: Season 17 rises against World Series?!
NCIS ratings pulled off an astounding feat on Oct. 22, as Season 17, Episode 5 took on the MLB World Series. See the latest NCIS numbers.
Live sports tend to crush most TV shows, but NCIS ratings actually went up this week against the opening game of the 2019 World Series.
Tuesday’s episode “Wide Awake” dealt with hypnotherapy and featured a guest appearance by TV veteran Laura San Giacomo (Just Shoot Me). But going up against MLB baseball, it figured to take a hit in the ratings.
But the CBS series broke that precedent instead.
The episode had 11.03 million live viewers, which was up from last Tuesday’s 10.61 (+0.42, or a gain of about 420,000). That made for the show’s best live audience in three weeks.
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NCIS did lose its title as Tuesday’s most-watched broadcast TV program; that did go to Game 1 of the World Series, which saw the Washington Nationals upset the Houston Astros in Houston.
But it was still the top scripted show, and continued to outlast its competition by a wide margin.
No other program reached the 8 million threshold on Tuesday, so “Wide Awake” was out in front by just over three million people tuned in live! That’s incredibly impressive, when most broadcast TV shows are considered hits if they can get between 7-9 million people to the small screen.
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In the key demo (adults aged 18-49), NCIS came in fifth with a 1.1 share. That means it brought in less of that group than the World Series, NBC‘s This Is Us and The Voice, and ABC‘s rebroadcast of It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown.
That’s no surprise, since the audience for the CBS crime drama does tend to skew older than most other TV shows. But being in the Top 5 is still nothing to turn one’s nose up at.
With non-baseball fans presumably looking for something else to watch, anyone who wanted to see a scripted show only had NCIS, The Flash and Charlie Brown to choose from. That’s much less competition than usual, and if you weren’t in the mood for a Halloween special, then Gibbs and his team were the most obvious choice.
NCIS ratings were still excellent this week, and being able to overcome a big obstacle is worth a round of applause.
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NCIS has next week off—though CBS will still show a rerun—so fans get a bit of a break. But this week proved why the series is still on the air; it’s got staying power and then some.