TV ratings: Tonys take on Miss USA; Spurs vs. Heat beats all

Sunday night on broadcast television was all about basketball, beauties and Broadway.

The Miami Heat’s victory over the San Antonio Spurs was narrow, but in the ratings, there was no contest at the top. The more interesting competition for ratings was between the Hugh Jackman-hosted Tony Awards on CBS and the Miss USA contest on NBC.

Starting with the winner, it’s safe to say Game 2 of the NBA Finals on ABC was the highest-rated telecast Sunday night, delivering a household rating of 10.2 in Nielsen’s 56 metered markets.

ABC’s prime-time rating for the night, including Jimmy Kimmel’s pregame show and the NBA Countdown, according to the unreliable “fast affiliate” numbers, was a 4.4 among key 18-to-49-year-old viewers, with about 11 million viewers overall.

Accurate numbers for the game, a 98-96 victory for LeBron James and the Heat in the rematch with the Spurs, will be released later on Monday.

Meanwhile, it was a big night for honors on network television.

The Tony Awards, back-slapping the best of Broadway at Radio City Music Hall, gave top kudos to Neil Patrick Harris, Bryan Cranston and “A Gentleman’s Guide to Love & Murder” -- and Nevada’s 4th-degree black belt Nia Sanchez was crowned Miss USA.

The Tonys had the advantage over the beauty pageant in total viewers, in which the theater honors came away with an average of 7.02 million compared with 5.55 million for Miss USA. But in the key demo, Hugh Jackman et al. were slightly behind the ladies on NBC, who earned a 1.4 rating. The Tonys notched a 1.2.

In 18-49, a ratings point equals about 1.3 million viewers.

Compared with last year, the Tonys were flat in the demo and down by about 4% in total viewership, and Miss USA was generally up year-over-year, by 8% in 18-49 and 21% in overall viewers.

The biggest telecast on Fox, other than reruns, was the final episode of “Cosmos,” the Neil deGrasse Tyson-hosted reboot of the classic science documentary created by Carl Sagan. The dark-matter episode of “Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey” closed out the series run with a 1.1 in 18-49, down 15% from last week, not surprising given the heavy competition.

The “Cosmos” average for the entire run was 3.9 million viewers overall and a 1.5 in 18-49.