TV ratings: Football dominates Sunday; Fox’s ‘Utopia’ has decent premiere

“Sunday Night Football” on NBC dominated TV ratings while Fox’s premiere of the social experiment reality show “Utopia” had a decent kick off.

According to preliminary Nielsen ratings, NBC was the most watched network Sunday night with a rating of 6.7 among the key demographic of 18-to-49-year-olds and roughly 18 million viewers. However, because of the nature of live sports, ratings for NBC are approximate.

About 21 million people tuned in to NBC to watch the Indianapolis Colts-Denver Broncos game, making it the most watched program of the night. It also won among the key demo with a rating of 8.0.

With a rating of 3.2 among 18-to-49-year-olds and about 7.9 million viewers, Fox came in second. The 49ers-Cowboys game earned a rating of 7.1 and averaged 19 million viewers.

The football lead-in helped attract 4.6 million viewers for the premiere of “Utopia.” The show, which follows contestants in a remote location, received a rating of 1.9 among the key demo, making it the eighth most watched program of the night and second most watched among non-football broadcasts.

It also received a bump from online views, generating 1 million streams in the first four days of the 24/7 live feed on UtopiaTV.com.

By comparison, “Utopia” was up 19% among the key demo from the debut of the network’s cooking competition show “MasterChef Jr.”

Meanwhile, CBS’ “Big Brother” was up 22% from last week in viewers, with roughly 7.1 million people tuning in to the privacy deprivation show. It was the seventh most watched program of the night among the key demo with a rating of 2.3.

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