ABC has its most-watched WNBA season

Despite Caitlin Clark missing nearly half of her scheduled ABC games, she played just enough to help the network to its most-watched WNBA regular season.

ABC finished its WNBA regular season slate with average of 1.43 million viewers over 12 games, up 13% from the network’s average of 1.26 million over eight games last season, and its most-watched WNBA season yet. ABC has carried the WNBA dating back to 2003, though until 2020 the network typically carried only one or two games per season. (Keep in mind the regular season average does not include the WNBA All-Star Game, which declined 36% this year.)

The double-digit increase over last year comes despite Fever G Caitlin Clark playing only three of her team’s five scheduled ABC games — but that still exceeded the two games she played on the network last season.

The three Clark games were the most-watched of the season on ABC, with an opening weekend matchup with the Sky averaging 2.7 million, a June meeting with the Liberty averaging 2.2 million, and a July matchup with the Wings averaging 2.1 million. Overall, ABC owns three of the four largest WNBA audiences this season, with the lone exception being a Liberty-Fever game that aired on CBS (2.2M).

The network ended its regular season schedule with an audience of 976,000 for Wings-Aces this past Sunday, unsurprisingly down more than half from Storm-Fever on the same weekend last year, which featured Clark and averaged 2.2 million.

While overall viewership was up 13 percent, ABC saw bigger gains among kids 2-17 (+21%) — including a 46% increase among boys 2-17 — the elusive men 18-34 demo (+18%), and adults 55+. It should be noted that ABC’s WNBA average exceeded that of its NHL regular season coverage, which was under the million mark.

ABC ranks as the most-watched WNBA broadcaster this season, with CBS ranking second at an average of 1.23 million through Saturday. The CBS average is up 8% from the same point last year, with one more game left on schedule (Liberty-Dream this coming weekend).

Clark has played in just one of three Fever games on CBS, down from two last year, but the two games she missed both aired in primetime — compared to zero such broadcasts last season.

On Saturday, CBS drew 793,000 for a Liberty-Lynx WNBA Finals rematch — up 25% from Lynx-Mystics in the same window a year ago, which was the first game of a doubleheader that included a Liberty-Aces Finals rematch at 874,000.