• by Wayne Friedman , June 15, 2009

The fifth game of ABC's "2009 NBA Finals" posted slightly lower ratings versus earlier games, which also resulted in less viewership versus last year's basketball championship.

ABC averaged a Nielsen preliminary 5.6 rating/17 share and 14.0 million for the final game, which was a bit lower than the series average so far.

Overall for the five-game series, which gave the Los Angeles Lakers its 15th NBA title over the Orlando Magic, the event averaged 5.8/18. That's versus a 6.1/18 a year ago, when the Boston Celtics beat the Lakers in a six-game series. Last year's event averaged 15.0 million viewers versus a 14.3 million average this time around.

ABC easily won the evening overall with 3.9/12 among 18-49 viewers. Fox saw less than half those results at a 1.6/5. Other networks drifted in at a much-lower effort: CBS, a 1.0/3; NBC, a 0.9/3; Univision, a 0.6/2; and the CW at a 0.4/1.

ABC's "Jimmy Kimmel Live" started off the night with a 2.9/11, with ABC's "NBA Countdown" show taking in a 3.2/11.

Fox ran repeats of its Sunday night sitcoms: two reruns of "King of the Hill," as well as "American Dad," "The Simpsons" and "Family Guy."

NBC ran a made-for-TV movie, "10.5: Apocalypse," which got a dismal 0.9/3. CW went with the original version of the theatrical movie "Taking of Pelham One Two Three," earning an 0.5/2.