The world was watching last night as the Warriors chased history and the Cavaliers and LeBron James chased a dream years in the making in the winner take all Game 7 of the 2016 NBA Finals. The most exciting event in sports.
According to overnight data, 30.8 million viewers watched Game 7, making it the most watched game since Game 6 of the 1998 NBA Finals, Michael Jordan’s last game as a Chicago Bull.
It was by far the highest rated NBA game in ABC’s history of televising the sport as well.
According to ESPN Sports Business Reporter Darren Rovell, almost 14 percent of the U.S. population was watching the game at its peak.
At its peak, 13.7 percent of the US was watching Game 7, a crazy number given the options we have today vs what we had in the past.
— Darren Rovell (@darrenrovell) June 20, 2016
Here is the breakdown of the percentage of people watching the game in the home markets:
46.3% of the TVs that were on in the Cleveland market last night were watching Game 7, 39.4% of the San Francisco market had game on.
— Darren Rovell (@darrenrovell) June 20, 2016
The NBA couldn’t have asked for a better finish to a series with so many historical implications and the two best players in the NBA dueling for the league’s ultimate prize.
The city of Cleveland is enjoying its first professional sports championship in 52 years and according to census data only 4 percent of people living in Cleveland now lived in the city when Jim Brown and the Cleveland Browns won an NFL championship in 1964.
