by The first NBA Finals Game 7 in almost a decade did solid songs on Sunday evening.
About 16.35 million people voted to see how the Thunder defeated the Indiana Pacers on Sunday evening, who gave the franchise his first NBA title since he moved to Oklahoma City, ESPN announced on Monday. The game also peaked at around 19.3 million viewers. That made it the most viewed NBA Finals game in six years.
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In total, the series had on average more than 10.2 million viewers per game. That falls around 9% compared to 2024. It is also the least viewed NBA final since 2007, when the San Antonio Spurs wiped the Cleveland Cavaliers, excluding the COVID-19 Pandemic influenced seasons in 2020 and 2021.
Although Sunday’s songs were undoubtedly a good show for the competition, it was the first winner-take-all game in the NBA Finals since 2016. It is easy to see why more fans tuned.
. Game 1 of the final was on average fewer than 9 million viewers on ABC earlier this month, making it the least viewed game 1 since 1988, with the exception of the 2020 and 2021 seasons. That was a fall of 19% in viewers of last year between the Boston Celtics and Dallas Mavericks.
Game 2 was worse. That competition, which won the Thunder in an eruption, was an average of 8.76 million viewers. That made it the least viewed game 2 since 2007, outside the Bubble Finals 2020 Covid-19. Game 3 was on average almost 9.2 million viewers, who fell almost 20% the year before from the same competition.
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And for comparison: the last game 7 – which took place in 2016 between the Cleveland Cavaliers and Golden State Warriors – had according to the. That game was also played on a Sunday evening. If you look at the two games side by side, this year’s figures do not see so well.
Although the reviews this season as a whole were not great, it follows with the smaller market teams that reached the final. Indianapolis and Oklahoma City are the 25th and 47th largest markets in the United States respectively. It also doesn’t really matter in the big schedule of things. The competition was also completed earlier this month, so there is no worries about making the final of this season.
And, perhaps even more importantly, the final went the full seven games and were almost the whole road incredibly entertaining. That is what the competition and basketball fans want everywhere. From a basketball position, and again crowned with another new winner, it is difficult to claim this season not successful for the NBA.
