• by Wayne Friedman , November 21, 2006

ABC's stock in another rookie show--"Brothers & Sisters"--is going up. On Sunday, the show earned a Nielsen preliminary 5.5 adults 18-49 rating, up from a 5.2 the week before. TV analysts say the show isn't as dark and serious as initial episodes, and that is drawing in a broader array of viewers. Early on, it garnered high 4 ratings among 18-49 viewers.

Going in the other direction was NBC's "Sunday Night Football," which fell 22% to a 4.5 from a 5.8 the week before. Ironically, the San Diego-Denver game was one that NBC was allowed to choose, as part of its unusual deal with the NFL. The week before, NBC was more successful in choosing another game, the New York Giants-Chicago Bears, which earned its best numbers to date.

All this put ABC first for the night among 18-49s, with a 5.7 rating/14 share. NBC slipped to third with a 4.5/11, just under CBS' 4.6/11. CBS got its usual boost for the night with a 6.2 during the 7 p.m. hour for an NFL football overrun, combined with the beginning of "60 Minutes."

ABC moved down a bit in the 9 p.m. time period, with an 8.6 rating for "Desperate Housewives." Still, it was the night's top-rated show among 18-49s. NBC was a distant second, with a 5.0 rating for "SNF" during that hour.

Fox offered up repeats in the 8 p.m. hour. That left it with a 2.1 average: "American Dad" got a 1.5 rating for 18-49 viewers and "The Simpsons," a 2.7 rating for 18-49. Fox finished fourth at 3.4/8. The CW was a distant fifth at 1.3/3. Behind the CW, Univision was sixth at 1.1/3.

While NBC suffered with football on Sunday, ABC gained from football on Saturday. ABC's match-up between college's top two teams--Ohio State and Michigan--earned a 13.4 household rating and 21,770,000 total viewers--the biggest audience and rating for any regular-season college football game on any network since 1993, when a regular-season Florida State and Notre Dame game scored with a 16.0 rating and 22,020,000 viewers.