• by Wayne Friedman , 4 hours ago

NBA playoff viewership has seen strong double-digit percentage gains -- up 20% -- through the first week-and-a-half of games.

The NBA's Nielsen-measured viewership is 3.84 million -- across NBC Universal, ESPN/ABC and Amazon Prime Video.

A year ago -- under its previous contract -- the games were aired on ESPN/ABC. TNT and NBA TV.

One major change is the higher number of games on broadcast TV (14) this year under the new deal, airing on NBA Television Network as well as its streamer Peacock -- up 53% versus a year ago, to average 5.1 million through the same ten games

All of the NBC games were aired on cable network TNT a year ago.

Viewing for the NHL playoffs is also up -- by massive 82% through the first nine days -- to 1.1 million on ESPN and TNT Sports.

For both the NBA and NHL, analysts say, this is largely attributable to Nielsen's shift to its Big Data + Panel from its panel-only measurement data.

Big Data includes data from 75 million devices and 45 million smart TV and pay TV (cable, satellite, virtual) set-top boxes. This is combined with Nielsen’s 42,000 home panel.

In addition, Nielsen ramped up its out-of-home viewing to 100% of U.S markets, starting last year.

National linear TV advertising revenues for NBA airings is at $106.7 million so far, with NHL TV ad revenue at $30.4 million, according to estimates from iSpot.

Part of NBA ad revenue has shifted this year to an exclusive deal with streaming Amazon Prime Video and airings on NBC’s Peacock simulcast with the NBC TV network.