The television numbers are in for the Brier and while
they’re solid, the audience for the final has to be a bit disappointing. For
the first time in recent memory the championship game didn’t crack one million
viewers on TSN.
The match-up between Manitoba’s Jeff Stoughton and eventual
winner Brad Jacobs of Northern Ontario topped out at 914,000.
That means that the final of the Scotties out-drew the Brier
this year. The women’s final drew
1,057,000. While that’s happened before, it is pretty rare. And it also
came on a night when the Scotties was up against the Academy Awards, usually
one of the biggest draws of the television year.
Part of the reason for the low Brier number could be the
teams. When a rink from audience-rich Southern Ontario is in the final, there
is usually a bigger number. Without Glenn Howard (or a Kevin Martin) and with
Jacobs not being a household name as of yet, many casual fans may have decided
to watch Walking Dead. As well, the later start – 8:30 EDT – could have had an
impact as well.
Make no mistake: TSN is overjoyed to see an audience number
of 914,000 and all week, the evening games brought in more than 500,000, so
that puts it up ahead or on pace with hockey (except for Leaf games) but I’m
sure the network was expecting more than a million.
The semi-final game between the two Ontario teams drew
754,000. The first page game between Glenn Howard and Stoughton had an audience
of 832, while the Jacobs game with Brad Gushue’s Newfoundland and Labrador
squad brought in 728,000.
And the bronze medal game? Oh right, that wasn’t on TV.
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