Football Scores For NBC, CBS Loses 'Race'

What the New York Yankees mean to baseball, and what the Los Angeles Lakers mean to basketball, is what the Dallas Cowboys mean to football--especially when everyone plays well.

Top-performing sport teams--with a longtime brand appeal--mean high ratings.

For NBC and a highly touted "Sunday Night Football" match-up between the strong Dallas Cowboys and the stronger New Orleans Saints, it meant a Nielsen preliminary 8.2 rating among 18-49 viewers. (The Saints beat the Cowboys easily, 42-17). For NBC, the game was one of the four best football games this year. (Final numbers were not available at press time.)

CBS also gained from football earlier in the evening, as part of an overrun from the late afternoon. The San Diego-Denver game was expected to earn a 5.8 rating in adults 18-49. CBS also did well with "The Amazing Race" finale, which should earn a 4.0 rating among 18-49 viewers when final numbers are tallied.

For "Amazing Race," this show stopped the bleeding of previous finales. The last finale this past spring posted a 3.5 number, against formidable competition from "American Idol" and "Lost." In fall 2005, the show grabbed a 4.3.

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Still, the improved "Race" couldn't compete with a two-hour "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition" from ABC, which put up a 5.3/12 in 18-49 between 8 p.m. and 10 p.m. An original episode of "Brothers & Sisters" at 10 p.m.--sans its usual big "Desperate Housewives" lead-in--still earned a respectable 4.0/10 in 18-49.

Fox' best stuff was "The Simpsons" at a 4.1/10 and a repeat of "Family Guy"--3.6/8 in viewers 18-49. CW's best was a 1.5 for "7th Heaven" and a 1.2 for an hour of "Reba."

The box score for the evening read this way: NBC, 6.2/15; ABC, 4.3/11; CBS, 4.0/10; Fox, 3.1/8; Univision, 1.4/3; CW, 1.2/3.

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