Spotted Ratings, Friday 3/25/11: 'Shark' Tanks

WHAT MATTERS:

• The big rating of interest on this evening (at least to me!) was the Friday premiere of Shark Tank (1.2). That 1.2 leading off the evening does not look good for a premiere, as it's down a stout 37% from its Sunday "preview" five days prior. It's also 19% below its average in its four Friday episodes all the way back in the opening weeks of 2010. It is ahead of Supernanny's average in the hour, so all hope is not lost, especially since the show actually grew from its timeslot premiere number in all three season 1 timeslots it had. It may need to do that again.

• Fringe ratings matter less now with the show recently renewed for season 4, but the 1.4 demo was up week-to-week. (Came down in finals to reduce those gains, though.) I don't buy into the idea that early renewals can (or are designed to) provide a short-term ratings boost, but I guess this'd be a piece of evidence in that theory's favor. Might be an idea worth looking at sometime!

• In unscripted news, it was Fox's Kitchen Nightmares and the rest of ABC's lineup below average while Who Do You Think You Are? and Dateline on NBC were both at season-second-best levels.

• CBS had basketball again, and again we saw the effect of just one other network airing March Madness (compared to three last week). The Kentucky/Ohio State classic in the second game was by far the highest-rated game of the tourney to date.

FULL TABLE:

	A18-49	Share	Last	Lead	LeLa	Comp	CoLa	bcShr	Avg	Rank
Shark Tank	1.2	4	-37%	n/a	n/a	5.2	-39%	19	-37%	2/2
Primetime: What Would You Do?	1.3	4	-13%	8%	20%	5.8	29%	18	-14%	14/19
20/20	1.4	4	8%	8%	-13%	9.8	87%	14	-9%	18/28
NCAA 1	1.8	8	n/a	n/a	n/a	4.7	n/a	28	n/a	1/1
NCAA Break	2.4	8	n/a	33%	n/a	5.0	n/a	32	n/a	1/1
NCAA 2	3.8	13	n/a	58%	n/a	5.6	n/a	37	n/a	1/1
Who Do You Think You Are?	1.3	5	44%	n/a	n/a	5.1	16%	20	11%	2/8
Dateline Fri	1.8	6	29%	38%	44%	7.2	49%	20	25%	2/25
Kitchen Nightmares	1.5	6	-6%	n/a	n/a	4.9	32%	23	-10%	8/9
Fringe	1.4	5	8%	-7%	-6%	5.7	21%	20	-19%	16/18
Smallville (R)	0.6	2	n/a	n/a	n/a	5.8	n/a	9	n/a	1/1
Supernatural (R)	0.5	1	n/a	-17%	n/a	6.6	n/a	7	n/a	1/1

VIEWING LEVELS:

Slot	Min HUT	Calc HUT	Max HUT
8-9pm	25.6	25.6	28.2
9-10pm	30.0	30.0	32.2
10-11pm	30.0	30.4	30.8
8-10pm	26.7	27.6	26.7

  
KEY (much more detail at What? and Why? page)

A18-49 - Percentage of US TV-owning adults 18-49 watching the program.
Share - Percentage of US TV-watching adults 18-49 watching the program.
Last - Percent difference from previous episode.
Lead - Percent difference from lead-in program.
LeLa - Percent difference between lead-in and previous episode's lead-in.
Comp - Total rating of other broadcast programs in the same timeslot. 10:00 programming multiplied by 1.75 to attempt a level playing field.
CoLa - Percent difference between competition and previous episode's competition.
bcShr - Percentage of US national big-5 broadcast TV-watching adults 18-49 watching the program. 10:00 programming multiplied by two-thirds to attempt a level playing field.
Avg - Percent difference from show's previous demo average this season.
Rank - Rank among show's episodes to date this season.

Min HUT/Max HUT - Smallest/largest percentage of TV-owning adults 18-49 that could be watching any TV in the timeslot.
Calc HUT - Estimate of the percentage of TV-owning adults 18-49 watching any TV in the timeslot. Formerly "HUT."

(R) = Regular-night repeat. These are ranked/averaged as if they were separate shows.
(oR) = Other-night repeat. These are not ranked/averaged in any way.

Stats in blue are less accurate due to lack of access to half-hour breakdowns.

Source: TravisYanan

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