TV Ratings : NBA Finals Win for NBC

The NBA finals between Chicago and Los Angeles sent NBC’s ratings soaring like Michael Jordan over the competition. Ratings released Tuesday by the A. C. Nielsen Co. showed that games 2, 3 and 4 captured positions 1, 2 and 4 among the week’s top-rated programs. That helped give NBC a 2.2 point advantage (about 2 million homes) over runner-up ABC in the weekly standings. Also finishing in the Top 15 for NBC were “In the Heat of the Night,” “A Different World,” “Seinfeld,” “Unsolved Mysteries,” “The Cosby Show” and “Empty Nest.” NBC didn’t fare as well with its evening newscast: “NBC Nightly News” was third, with ABC’s “World News Tonight” a dominant first. The full list of ratings is on F9.

* Former Surgeon General C. Everett Koop didn’t burn up the ratings with his first NBC special about the state of health care in America. The show finished third in its time slot June 4--behind “China Beach” on ABC and a TV movie, “Taken Away,” on CBS--and ranked 56th among the week’s 91 prime-time programs. But Koop’s words didn’t go into a vacuum: It’s 8 rating translated to nearly 7.5 million households.

Show Points Share 1. “NBA Finals -- Game 2” (NBC) 16.1 29 2. “NBA Finals -- Game 3” (NBC) 15.7 31 3. “Roseanne” (ABC) 15.5 27 4. “NBA Finals -- Game 4” (NBC) 15.2 30 5. “Cheers” (NBC) 15.0 27 * “C. Everett Koop, M.D.” (NBC) 8.0 15