Top 100 Primetime Cable: Dec 29, 2014 - Jan 4, 2015

Football! Football!! Football!!! That is what most of cable viewers watched over the final holiday week of 2014. Between the College Bowl games, the College playoff games and the NFL, football programming took the top 11 spots. All of those spots were owned by ESPN. And that is why they can command over $6 per subscriber, from the cable companies, just for the flagship channel.

The two New Year's Day playoff games, featuring the schools of Oregon, Ohio State, Alabama and Florida State, attracted and kept over 28 million viewers, on ESPN, for over seven straight hours. The A18-49 ratings did fluctuate by little more than a half a point, but when you are in the 8 to 9 point range, that is not a huge issue. The title game is this Monday. January 12th, on ESPN.

After football, the cable chart starts to look somewhat normal. GOLD RUSH is the top program, after the football games, ranking 12th and pulling in over 4.4 million viewers. It was also was easily the top reality program, beating THE REAL HOUSEWIVES OF ATLANTA by more than a million viewers.

MAJOR CRIMES (#13) was the top scripted series, hauling in 4.4 million viewers, for TNT. The Network had the only two original cable scripted shows, in the top 25.

TBS and reruns of THE BIG BANG THEORY littered the chart with 29 episodes hitting within the top 100. That is nearly one-third of the chart, for the single series.

Rank	Day	Show	Net	Time	Viewers*	A18-49
1	Thu	College Football Playoffs	ESPN	9:00 PM	28.27	8.9
2	Thu	College Studio Show	ESPN	9:00 PM	28.18	8.7
3	Thu	College Football Playoffs	ESPN	5:15 PM	28.16	8.3
4	Sat	NFL Wildcard (CAR v ARZ)	ESPN	4:15 PM	21.68	6.9
5	Wed	Orange Bowl	ESPN	8:15 PM	8.94	2.6
6	Wed	Bowl Studio Show	ESPN	8:15 PM	8.23	2.5
7	Wed	Bowl Studio Show	ESPN	8:00 PM	8.13	2.5
8	Tue	College Bowl Game	ESPN	6:30 PM	6.41	1.9
9	Mon	College Bowl Game	ESPN	9:00 PM	5.76	1.8
10	Fri	Alamo Bowl	ESPN	6:45 PM	5.60	1.5
11	Mon	College Bowl Game	ESPN	6:00 PM	4.90	1.5
12	Fri	Gold Rush	DISC	9:00 PM	4.44	1.5
13	Mon	Major Crimes	TNT	9:00 PM	4.43	0.7
14	Fri	Cactus Bowl	ESPN	10:30 PM	4.03	1.1
15	Mon	WWE Raw	USA	10:00 PM	3.73	1.3
16	Sun	The Librarians	TNT	8:00 PM	3.73	1.0
17	Tue	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	9:30 PM	3.63	1.2
18	Fri	Movie: Finding Nemo	DSNY	8:00 PM	3.51	1.0
19	Mon	WWE Raw	USA	9:00 PM	3.48	1.1
20	Tue	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	9:00 PM	3.45	1.1
21	Sun	The Real Housewives/ATL	BRVO	8:00 PM	3.36	1.6
22	Tue	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	8:30 PM	3.25	1.1
23	Tue	College Bowl Game	ESPN	10:00 PM	3.24	1.0
24	Mon	WWE Raw	USA	8:00 PM	3.17	1.1
25	Fri	Alaskan Bush People	DISC	10:00 PM	3.13	1.0
26	Sun	Alaska: The Last Frontier	DISC	9:00 PM	3.08	0.8
27	Sun	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	9:30 PM	3.02	1.1
28	Fri	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	9:30 PM	2.94	1.0
29	Sun	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	9:00 PM	2.92	1.0
30	Fri	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	9:00 PM	2.81	1.0
31	Tue	High School Musical 3	DSNY	8:00 PM	2.80	0.4
32	Sun	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	10:00 PM	2.79	1.0
33	Sun	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	8:30 PM	2.66	0.9
34	Mon	High School Musical 2	DSNY	8:00 PM	2.66	0.4
35	Thu	NCIS	USA	8:00 PM	2.64	0.5
36	Sun	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	10:30 PM	2.62	1.0
37	Fri	WWE Smackdown	SYFY	8:00 PM	2.58	0.7
38	Tue	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	8:00 PM	2.57	0.8
39	Sat	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	9:30 PM	2.54	0.9
40	Thu	NCIS	USA	9:00 PM	2.53	0.4
41	Mon	Street Outlaws	DISC	9:00 PM	2.50	1.0
42	Tue	Moonshiners	DISC	9:00 PM	2.49	0.8
43	Thu	NCIS	USA	10:00 PM	2.48	0.5
44	Tue	Little Couple	TLC	9:00 PM	2.48	0.7
45	Sat	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	9:00 PM	2.44	0.8
46	Fri	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	8:30 PM	2.44	0.7
47	Sat	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	10:00 PM	2.43	0.8
48	Sat	NCIS	USA	9:00 PM	2.39	0.4
49	Sun	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	8:00 PM	2.33	0.8
50	Wed	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	10:00 PM	2.32	0.7
51	Sun	Sports Center	ESPN	8:45 PM	2.30	0.9
52	Sat	NCIS	USA	8:00 PM	2.29	0.4
53	Sun	JESSIE	DSNY	8:00 PM	2.28	0.5
54	Mon	Big Screen movie	FAM	8:00 PM	2.25	0.9
55	Mon	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	10:30 PM	2.19	0.8
56	Sun	JESSIE	DSNY	8:30 PM	2.17	0.4
57	Sun	Worst Cooks	FOOD	9:00 PM	2.12	0.8
58	Sat	NCIS	USA	10:00 PM	2.08	0.3
59	Thu	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	10:30 PM	2.06	0.8
60	Sun	JESSIE	DSNY	7:30 PM	2.06	0.5
61	Sat	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	10:30 PM	2.05	0.7
62	Fri	Gold Rush	DISC	8:00 PM	2.04	0.5
63	Wed	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	9:30 PM	2.01	0.6
64	Sat	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	8:30 PM	2.01	0.7
65	Fri	American Dad	ADSM	10:30 PM	2.00	0.7
66	Wed	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	9:00 PM	2.00	0.6
67	Sat	Austin & Jessie & Ally in NY	DSNY	10:00 PM	1.99	0.4
68	Fri	Castle	TNT	8:00 PM	1.96	0.4
69	Sun	Family Guy	ADSM	10:30 PM	1.96	0.9
70	Sun	Ax Men	HIST	9:00 PM	1.96	0.6
71	Mon	House Hunters	HGTV	10:00 PM	1.96	0.5
72	Sun	Law & Order: SVU	USA	7:00 PM	1.95	0.6
73	Sun	Law & Order: SVU	USA	8:00 PM	1.95	0.6
74	Sat	JESSIE	DSNY	9:30 PM	1.94	0.4
75	Sat	DAMAGED	LIFE	8:00 PM	1.94	0.6
76	Tue	American Dad	ADSM	10:30 PM	1.93	0.9
77	Wed	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	10:30 PM	1.92	0.6
78	Fri	American Dad	ADSM	10:00 PM	1.91	0.7
79	Sun	Law & Order: SVU	USA	9:00 PM	1.91	0.6
80	Mon	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	10:00 PM	1.90	0.7
81	Thu	HGTV 2015 Dream Home	HGTV	8:00 PM	1.89	0.5
82	Sun	Kourt & Khlo	E	9:00 PM	1.84	0.9
83	Thu	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	10:00 PM	1.83	0.7
84	Sun	Beachfront Bargin Hunt	HGTV	8:30 PM	1.82	0.5
85	Fri	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	8:00 PM	1.81	0.5
86	Wed	Law & Order: SVU	USA	8:00 PM	1.80	0.6
87	Tue	Moonshiners	DISC	10:00 PM	1.78	0.5
88	Mon	American Dad	ADSM	10:30 PM	1.76	0.8
89	Tue	American Dad	ADSM	10:00 PM	1.75	0.8
90	Sun	NFL Primetime	ESPN	7:45 PM	1.74	0.6
91	Sat	JESSIE	DSNY	8:30 PM	1.74	0.4
92	Thu	American Dad	ADSM	10:30 PM	1.74	0.7
93	Sun	Alaska: The Last Frontier	DISC	8:00 PM	1.74	0.4
94	Sat	College Basketball	ESPN	8:15 PM	1.73	0.7
95	Sun	Law & Order: SVU	USA	10:00 PM	1.72	0.6
96	Tue	Ground Floor	TBS	10:00 PM	1.71	0.7
97	Sun	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	7:30 PM	1.71	0.6
98	Sun	Sunday Movie	FAM	8:00 PM	1.70	0.7
99	Sun	Sister Wives	TLC	9:00 PM	1.68	0.7
100	Tue	The Big Bang Theory	TBS	10:30 PM	1.68	0.6

* - in millions