• by Wayne Friedman , July 7, 2009

If you needed a break from the Michael Jackson tributes, there was lighter fare on network TV drawing some summer crowds on Monday night.

ABC's two-hour "The Bachelorette" continues to offer some buzz in the reality TV show genre, posting a Nielsen Media Research preliminary 2.6 rating/8 share among 18-49 viewers on Mondays.

The "Bachelorette" won its 8 p.m. hour with a 2.4/8, beating four other network repeats. Overall, the show had a modest 8% drop in the 18-49 demographic group from the week before.

ABC's new reality effort at 10 p.m. from ABC's "Here Come The Newlyweds" posted a more humble 1.8/5, losing out to a repeat of CBS' "CSI: Miami," which took in a 2.0/6.

Although ABC won the night over CBS with a slight 2.3/7 to CBS' 2.2/7, CBS still led the way with the best-rated shows of the night: a tie between repeats of "Two and a Half Men" and "The Big Bang Theory." Both recorded a 2.7/8.

Overall, CBS continues to get some big prime-time wins this summer from its usually strong repeats of its shows.

NBC decided to put its resources into re-airing a "Law & Order: CI" episode from its sister network USA Network. At 10 p.m., NBC went with a fresh "Dateline NBC," which brought it to third place with a 1.5/4. NBC could only muster a 1.3/4, which was the network's average 18-49 rating for the night, good for fourth place.

Univision took a third place among 18-49 viewers with a 1.6/5, and second place among younger 18-34 viewers with a 1.8/6.

Fox ended with a 1.1/3 among 18-49 viewers, just behind NBC. CW was next at a 0.3/1.