In L.A.’s News War, KABC-TV Sweeps Up : Television: Channel 7 dominates among the network-owned stations in nearly every news time period. KTLA trounces the network shows in the 7-9 a.m. breakfast club.

A new TV season this fall didn’t change the local news scene much as perennial champs KABC-TV Channel 7 and KTLA-TV Channel 5 continued to roll during the just-concluded November ratings sweeps, according to statistics released Thursday by the A.C. Nielsen Co.

KABC continued to dominate the news race among the network-owned stations, winning nearly every news time period last month, despite a marked improvement by arch-rival KNBC-TV Channel 4 over its dismal performance the previous November, one of three major ratings periods each year that are used by local television stations to set advertising rates.

KNBC’s rating for its 11 p.m. newscast leaped more than 20% over a year ago, enabling the station to make up a 90,000 household deficit and squeak out a victory, averaging about 400,000 homes a night compared to about 395,000 for KABC. Though Channel 4 also improved its marks during the afternoon newscast, the 11 p.m. broadcast turned out to be its only win.

KABC also enjoyed ratings increases in the afternoon and easily won the 4 p.m., 5 p.m. and 6 p.m. newscasts. Thanks to the huge advantage at 3 p.m. provided by the “The Oprah Winfrey Show,” which lured more than twice as many viewers as KNBC’s “Sally Jessy Raphael,” KABC continued to wallop KNBC at 4 p.m. by 130,000 homes, at 5 p.m. by 80,000 homes and at 6 p.m. by 95,000 homes.

KABC also gained a rare victory in the competitive 6 a.m. news battle. KNBC, which invented the early-morning newscast several years ago and has generally dominated the time period, was second, followed by KTLA, KCBS-TV Channel 2 and KTTV-TV Channel 11.

The gains by both KABC and KNBC in the afternoon came at the expense of KCBS, which saw its ratings decline from a year ago in nearly every news time period. For example, the station’s 6 p.m. broadcast, which last year had surpassed KNBC for second place in the Los Angeles-Orange-Ventura County market, lost 27% of its audience. And at 11 p.m., KCBS, which in the past six months has hired a new general manager and news director, managed only about half the audience of its two network-owned rivals.

In the battle of the network news stars, Peter Jennings’ “World News Tonight” on KABC smashed his competition at 6:30 p.m. “Nightly News With Tom Brokaw” on KNBC was second and the CBS team of Dan Rather and Connie Chung on KCBS was third--about 165,000 homes behind the leader.

On the independent side, KTLA again outpaced its closest rival at 10 p.m. by about 100,000 homes. KTTV, which this week hired John Beard away from KNBC to anchor its own broadcast, was doing fairly well without him, gaining 16% over a year ago to finish second. KCAL-TV Channel 9 was third at 10 p.m. and KCOP-TV Channel 13 finished last.

KTLA also dominated the 7-9 a.m. breakfast news club, trouncing the three network shows--”Good Morning America” on KABC, “Today” on KNBC and “This Morning” on KCBS--and nearly quadrupling the score of KTTV’s fledgling program. KTLA’s follow-up “Morning Show” didn’t fare quite so well at 9 a.m., trailing both “Live With Regis & Kathie Lee” on KABC and “Family Feud” on KCBS.

Much has been made over the late-night battle between Jay Leno and David Letterman, but in this market it’s no contest: Ted Koppel beats them both. “Nightline” on KABC at 11:30 p.m. grabbed viewers in an average of 300,000 homes a night. Meanwhile, Leno’s “Tonight Show” on KNBC, holding steady from a year ago despite the Letterman challenge, finished second with about 215,000 homes, beating Letterman’s “Late Show” on KCBS by about 20,000 homes.

KCOP’s “Arsenio Hall Show” seemed to be the big casualty locally in the late-night shakedown, losing one-third of its audience of last year and sinking to last in the time period behind reruns on KTLA and KTTV and “Jane Whitney” on KCAL. Even KCAL’s “Shirley,” which overlaps “Arsenio” for a half-hour at midnight, proved more popular.

Among the daytime talk shows, “Oprah” remains unsurpassed, scoring twice as many local viewers as any competitor. “Rush Limbaugh” on KCOP has the next largest audience.

At 4 p.m., “Montel Williams” on KCOP outdrew “Geraldo” on KCBS. At 2 p.m., “Jenny Jones,” which used to be on Channel 4 but now airs on Channel 13, beat “Donahue,” the slipping veteran that replaced her on Channel 4. “Ricki Lake,” airing at 5 p.m. on KCOP, also scored well.

The big losers in the glut of daytime talk include KCAL’s “Live in L.A.,” which at 10 a.m. was battered by “The Price Is Right” on KCBS and “The Home Show” on KABC and managed only to tie reruns of “Magnum, P.I.” on KTLA. It did, however, beat the new effort from “Bertice Berry” on KTTV.

Bigger losers were “Joan Rivers,” whose noontime program on KTLA lost to everything in the time period, including reruns of “Gilligan’s Island,” and KTTV’s “The Mo Show,” which is favored by some TV critics as the funniest talk show going, but finished up last month as L.A.’s least favorite.

The ever-popular tandem of “Jeopardy!” and “Wheel of Fortune” continued to dominate the 7 p.m. hour for KABC, although “Wheel” dropped by about 50,000 households from a year ago. Those former fans might have jumped over to KNBC’s “Hard Copy,” which gained about 60,000 homes to finish a strong second at 7:30 p.m. Reruns of “Star Trek: The Next Generation” on KCOP also showed a significant increase over last November, while “A Current Affair” on KTTV plunged 22%. KCAL’s new entry into the magazine/tabloid news game, “American Journal,” finished last in the 7:30 p.m. time period.

In the high-stakes, prime-time race, CBS eked ahead of last year’s November sweeps winner, ABC, by about 280,000 homes nationwide. Both networks averaged a 21% share of the prime-time audience. NBC trailed ABC by about 500,000 homes with a 20% share, while Fox finished fourth with a 12% share. Fox reported, however, that in its target 18- to 34-year-old demographic, it outperformed CBS and finished within one rating point of both ABC and NBC.

Among Spanish-language stations, KMEX-TV Channel 34 knocked off KVEA-TV Channel 52 in both the 6 p.m. and 11 p.m. local newscasts. According to Nielsen’s special Hispanic Household survey, KMEX is the favored station of Latinos in this market, while KTTV is second and KVEA is third.