• by February 1, 2002

Nielsen//NetRatings reports that traffic to SuperBowl.com, the official website for the 36th annual Super Bowl, soared 399% during the week ending January 27, as football fans at-home logged on for the latest analysis of the AFC and NFC conference championships. SuperBowl.com attracted 799,000 unique visitors as compared to 160,000 visitors during the week ending January 6.

Thirty-one percent of the visitors to SuperBowl.com accessed the page featuring the upcoming game between the St. Louis Rams and the New England Patriots, while 15% of the site's audience clicked on pages featuring play-by-play analysis of the conference championships.

"The online presence of Superbowl.com complements the expansive TV coverage of the game. Fans are able to head to the Web for behind-the-scenes interviews and details about the players, the team and the history of the big game," said Allen Weiner, VP and principal analyst at NetRatings.

"Working together, TV serves up live game action while the Internet puts the consumer in the driver's seat to access Super Bowl statistics, video streams and commentary at any time," continued Weiner.

Surfers accessed more than 5.2 million pages, skyrocketing 533% in the past four weeks. Surfers spent twice as much time at SuperBowl.com this past week, rising to six minutes as compared to three minutes spent on the site the week of the divisional playoffs. The site attracted a predominantly male audience with a 64/36 gender split.