• by Wayne Friedman , June 5, 2020

Only five of the top 20 broadcast networks TV series and 15 of 133 shows posted viewing gains versus a year ago.

Two big gainers were NFL sports programs: Top-rated “Sunday Night Football” on NBC and third-best-rated “Thursday Night Football” on Fox.

This comes as broadcast TV networks continue to post mid-double-digit-percentage linear TV/time-shifted viewing declines overall compared to a year ago.

“Sunday Night Football” continued its long-time leadership position among all broadcast TV shows -- up 6.1% to 20.09 million viewers, looking at Nielsen-measured data, live program-plus-seven days of time-shifted viewing.

The highest-rated non-sports entertainment -- CBS' “NCIS” -- was down 3.5% to 15.34 million, coming in at second place overall. “Thursday Night Football,” in third place, was up 4.3% versus a year ago to 15.05 million viewers.

Three scripted entertainment shows also had gains in the top 20 most-viewed shows: NBC’s Chicago Fire,” up 0.3% to 11.7 million, NBC’s “Chicago PD” up 0.8% to 11.23 million, and Fox’s “911” growing 3.5% to 10.42 million.

Ten of the next 113 shows also showed improvements -- with ABC grabbing four rising TV series: CBS’s “Magnum P.I.” up 6.6% to 8.91 million; ABC’s “American Idol” (Monday), up 6.7% to 8.54 million; ABC’s “Station 19”, up 11.2%, 8.52 million; ABC’s “The Bachelor” inching up 0.1% to 7.93 million, CBS’ “Man with a Plan,” up 14.8% to 7.37 million; and ABC’s “Shark Tank,” up 2.1% to 4.95 million.

NBC’s “Dateline: Friday” was up 2.7% to 4.87 million, while “Fox College Football” was 48% higher to 3.21 million viewers; The CW’s “All American” rose 11.3% to 1.18 million viewers; and CW’s “Whose Line Is It Anyway?” was up 4.5% to 1.15 million viewers.

The biggest-percentage losers were NBC’s “This Is Us,” down 16.3% to 11.55 million; CBS’ “Young Sheldon,” declining 22.2% to 11.45 million; ABC’s “The Good Doctor,” down 14.4% to 10.82 million; NBC’s “New Amsterdam,” losing 12.2% to 9.68 million, and CBS’ “NCIS: New Orleans,” down 11.5% to 9.58 million.