CBS leads a stay-at-home week with ‘NCIS,’ ‘FBI’ and ‘Young Sheldon’

With much of the nation under stay-at-home orders because of the coronavirus pandemic and no competition from live sports events on cable, “NCIS” drew the season’s largest audience for a scripted program for the second consecutive week, leading CBS to a sweep of the top four spots in the weekly prime-time ratings and its eighth consecutive victory.

The CBS action drama averaged 13.656 million viewers, its most since May 8, 2018, according to live-plus-same-day figures released Tuesday by Nielsen. “NCIS” averaged 13.196 million viewers a week earlier.

It was the third time in four weeks and fourth time this season that “NCIS” has been the week’s most-watched program. “NCIS” is the only scripted program to top the weekly ratings during the 28-week-old 2019-20 prime-time television season.

The second-season crime drama “FBI,” which followed “NCIS,” had a series high for the second consecutive week, averaging 10.858 million viewers. Its previous high was 10.691 million viewers.

CBS’ “Young Sheldon” was the week’s only other program to average more than 10 million viewers, averaging a season-high 10.141 million viewers.

“60 Minutes” was fourth for the week, averaging 9.995 million viewers. The newsmagazine has finished first twice, second twice, third once and fourth once over the past six weeks.

The finale of “Hawaii Five-0” was sixth for the week, averaging 9.591 million viewers, its most since Jan. 5, 2018.

CBS also got season highs from its other two Friday series. “Blue Bloods” averaged 8.766 million viewers following “Hawaii Five-0,” its most since Feb. 15, 2019, to finish eighth for the week and first among 10 p.m. programs. “MacGyver” averaged its largest audience since Feb. 2, 2018, 7.073 million, tying for 17th.

CBS also had the only premiere on the four major broadcast networks, “Broke,” which drew the season’s largest audience for a comedy premiere, averaging 7.073 million viewers, and tied for 17th overall, and third among comedies airing between March 30 and Sunday.

“Broke” retained 92.8% of the audience of “Mom” that preceded it. “Mom” averaged 7.624 million viewers, 13th for the week, second among comedies.

CBS averaged 6.65 million viewers for its 13th victory of the season. ABC was second after back-to-back third-place finishes, averaging 4.86 million viewers.

NBC was third among the broadcast networks after back-to-back second-place finishes, averaging 4.01 million viewers. It aired reruns of all three elements of its “Chicago” franchise, which were fourth, seventh and 12th the previous week.

Fox was fourth among the broadcast networks for the ninth time in the nine weeks following its Super Bowl LIV telecast, averaging 3.24 million viewers for its 15 hours of prime-time programming.

CBS, ABC and NBC each aired 22 hours of prime-time programming.

ABC’s highest rated program was the season finale of the medical drama “The Good Doctor,” 11th for the week, averaging 7.713 million viewers.

The singing competition “The Voice” was NBC’s most popular program, averaging 9.778 million viewers, fifth for the week and second-most for a Monday telecast since March 18, 2019.

“The Voice” has been first among alternative series six times in the six weeks of its spring season. It has been in the top five each week of its spring season.

“The Masked Singer” was Fox’s top ranked show for the eighth time since the week of its Super Bowl telecast, averaging 8.903 million viewers, the most since its post-Super Bowl episode, to finish seventh for the week.

Fox News Channel won the cable network race for the 11th consecutive week, averaging 4.065 million viewers, third among all networks behind CBS and ABC, surpassing NBC.

As it did a week earlier, Fox News Channel had each of the week’s 15 top prime-time cable programs. Its highest ranked show was the Tuesday edition of “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” which averaged 5.032 million viewers, 28th overall.

CNN was second, averaging 2.251 million viewers. MSNBC averaged 2.072 million viewers to finish third after finishing second five of the previous six weeks.