‘Dancing’ shows the fall classic its heels

That’s fancy footwork!

ABC’s “Dancing With the Stars” took the top spot in last week’s prime-time TV ratings with its Monday edition, outstepping even the World Series’ decisive Game 4.

Overall the week belonged to Fox, which scored big with its coverage of the Boston Red Sox vs. the Colorado Rockies. All four games of the Red Sox sweep landed in the top 15, with the Game 4 audience totaling nearly 21 million viewers, according to figures released Tuesday by Nielsen Media Research.

NBC didn’t have such a good week, particularly without its usual Sunday night football. It averaged about half of Fox’s viewers to claim a puny fourth-place showing among the networks.

NBC’s new reality series “Phenomenon” ranked a not-so-phenomenal 45th place. Once deemed a budding hit with a debut audience of 13.9 million viewers, the network’s “Bionic Woman” in its fifth airing sank to 7.81 million. Crushed by its “Dancing” competition, “Chuck,” another NBC freshman, had only 7.22 million -- with the network’s other two fall entries, “Life” and “Journeyman,” logging even smaller audiences.

Here are the rankings for national prime-time network television last week (Oct. 22-28) as compiled by Nielsen Media Research. They are based on the average number of people who watched a program from start to finish. Nielsen estimates there are 286 million potential viewers in the U.S. ages 2 and older. Viewership is listed in millions.

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*--* 1 Dancing With the Stars (Mon.) ABC 21.37 2 World Series Game 4 (Sun.) FOX 20.94 3 Desperate Housewives ABC 18.28 4 Grey’s Anatomy (Thu.) ABC 18.17 5 House FOX 18.11

6 Dancing With the Stars (Tue.) ABC 18.06 7 NCIS CBS 17.26 8 World Series Game 2 (Thu.) FOX 16.95 9 World Series Game 1 (Wed.) FOX 16.90 10 CSI: Miami CBS 15.66

11 Criminal Minds CBS 15.05 12 CSI (Thu.) CBS 14.96 13 Extreme Makeover: Home Edition ABC 14.39 14 Survivor: China CBS 14.19 15 World Series Game 3 (Sat.) FOX 14.05

16 Two and a Half Men CBS 13.94 17 CSI: NY CBS 13.82 18 Samantha Who? ABC 13.68 19 “World Series Game 4 Pre-Game” (Sun.) FOX 13.38 20 60 Minutes CBS 13.05

21 Without a Trace CBS 12.73 22 Brothers & Sisters ABC 12.59 23 Law & Order: SVU NBC 12.31 24 Private Practice ABC 11.91 25 Cold Case CBS 11.78

26 “World Series Game 1 Pre-Game” (Wed.) FOX 11.55 27 The Unit CBS 10.84 28 Rules of Engagement CBS 10.82 29 Heroes NBC 10.81 30 Deal or No Deal (Fri.) NBC 10.47

31 20/20 ABC 10.37 32 Shark CBS 10.26 33 Ghost Whisperer CBS 9.99 34 Ugly Betty ABC 9.98 35 Numb3rs CBS 9.70

36 Pushing Daisies ABC 9.67 37 E.R. NBC 9.25 38 CSI (Sun.) CBS 9.11 39 America’s Funniest Home Videos ABC 9.02 40 The Office NBC 8.96

41 Bones FOX 8.94 -- Women’s Murder Club ABC 8.94 43 The Bachelor ABC 8.92 44 The Big Bang Theory CBS 8.81 45 Phenomenon NBC 8.55

46 How I Met Your Mother CBS 8.50 47 Moonlight CBS 8.39 48 Dirty Sexy Money ABC 8.26 49 Las Vegas NBC 8.23 50 The OT (football post-game) FOX 8.22

51 My Name Is Earl NBC 8.20 52 “World Series Game 2: Pre-Game” (Thu.) FOX 8.02 53 Cane CBS 7.97 54 “World Series Game 3 Pre-Game” (Sat.) FOX 7.95 55 Kid Nation CBS 7.86

56 Bionic Woman NBC 7.81 57 Crimetime Saturday (9 p.m.) CBS 7.70 58 48 Hours Mystery CBS 7.65 59 Prison Break FOX 7.44 60 Saturday Night Football ABC 7.40

61 Big Shots ABC 7.38 62 Chuck NBC 7.22 63 The Biggest Loser 4 NBC 7.12 64 Scrubs NBC 6.95 65 Carpoolers ABC 6.94

66 Life NBC 6.87 67 The Singing Bee NBC 6.73 68 Crimetime Saturday (8 p.m.) CBS 6.63 69 30 Rock NBC 6.50 70 Men in Trees ABC 6.44

71 Cavemen ABC 6.21 72 Journeyman NBC 6.06 73 K-Ville FOX 6.04 74 “College Football Pre-Game” ABC 6.02 75 Destilando Amor (Wed.) UNI 5.97

76 Destilando Amor (Thu.) UNI 5.91 77 Destilando Amor (Mon.) UNI 5.89 -- “Bourne Supremacy” NBC 5.89 79 Friday Night Lights NBC 5.80 80 Destilando Amor (Fri.) UNI 5.66

81 Destilando Amor (Tue.) UNI 5.50 82 America’s Top Model 3 (Wed.) CW 4.74 83 Friday Night Smackdown! CW 4.69 84 Smallville CW 4.65 85 Cristina UNI 4.50

86 Grey’s Anatomy (Fri.) ABC 4.25 87 Familia P. Luche UNI 4.03 88 “Futbol Liga Mexicana” UNI 3.65 89 Don Francisco Presenta UNI 3.57 90 Football Night in America, Part 2 NBC 3.45

91 Retro P. Luche UNI 3.39 92 Dateline: NBC (Sun.) NBC 3.34 93 Aqui y Ahora UNI 3.27 94 Beauty and the Geek CW 3.24 95 Bionic Woman (Sat.) NBC 3.23

96 “Scary Movie” NBC 3.20 97 Supernatural CW 3.18 98 Yo Amo Juan Querendon (Mon.) UNI 3.01 99 Amar Sin Limites (Mon.) UNI 2.99 100 Next Great American Band FOX 2.89

101 Amar Sin Limites (Tue.) UNI 2.71 102 Yo Amo Juan Querendon (Tue.) UNI 2.67 103 Yo Amo Juan Querendon (Wed.) UNI 2.65 104 The Game CW 2.61 -- Reaper CW 2.61

106 Sabado Gigante UNI 2.56 107 Amar Sin Limites (Fri.) UNI 2.55 108 Amar Sin Limites (Wed.) UNI 2.54 -- Gossip Girl CW 2.54 -- SOS: Sexo y Otros Secretos UNI 2.54

111 Amar Sin Limites (Thu.) UNI 2.52 -- Everybody Hates Chris CW 2.52 113 Yo Amo Juan Querendon (Thu.) UNI 2.47 114 Yo Amo Juan Querendon (Fri.) UNI 2.44 115 Aliens in America (Mon.) CW 2.36

116 Girlfriends CW 2.21 117 Cine Especial UNI 1.90 118 America’s Top Model 3 (Sun.) CW 1.44 119 Hora Pico UNI 1.27 120 Parodia UNI 1.13

121 Life Is Wild CW 1.08 122 Aliens in America (Sun.) CW 0.75 123 CW Now CW 0.70 *--*

Network averages

Here is the number of viewers (in millions) that each network averaged per hour of prime time, for last week and for the season.

*--* Network Last week Season to date FOX 13.78 9.74

ABC 11.19 11.12

CBS 11.17 11.56

NBC 7.00 8.50

UNI 3.42 3.33

CW 2.96 2.97 *--*