WABI scores big ratings with state football games Foxcroft-Lisbon was most-watched

The numbers are in, and although executives at Bangor television station WABI (Channel 5) are still poring over them, they’ve done nothing to diminish the holiday spirit at 35 Hildreth Street.

WABI’s live, high school state championship football tripleheader back on Nov. 19 – the first of its kind in Maine – appears to have been a ratings touchdown for WABI.

“We did better than expected early on and then late as well,” said WABI program director Steve Hiltz. “That late game was fantastic.”

The games – Class A at 11 a.m., Class B at 2:30 p.m. and Class C at 6 p.m. – garnered higher-than-expected ratings and won all but one time slot from 11 a.m. through 8 p.m.

The average rating (the percentage of total households in the market turned to a specific program) per broadcast for its entire run was 1.5 for the A game between Bonny Eagle of Standish and Mt. Blue of Farmington, 5.7 for the Class B Brewer-York game, and a whopping 8.0 for Class C’s Foxcroft Academy-Lisbon game.

In terms of actual homes or households in the Bangor DMA (designated market area), the numbers were 2,100 for the A game, 8,200 for B, and 11,400 for C. Those numbers are even better when you include all the markets that WABI broadcast the game to, such as Waterville and Augusta. Those numbers are 5,300 households for A, 12,000 for B, and 16,600 for C.

“We didn’t expect those numbers for the C game. It was also the best game of the day, which helped, but it’s still surprising unless you know the explanation,” Hiltz said. “One is it’s 6 o’clock at night and it’s closer to prime time, but here’s the other issue that gave us a big number: At 6, WLBZ (Ch. 2) still had Notre Dame football on, and historically, it doesn’t fare well against local college or high school football.

“The previous week, for example, the Maine-Rhode Island game at 2 p.m. [three-hour broadcast] averaged a 6 rating and 24 share [percentage of viewers watching a particular program at a certain time] vs. a 1 and a 6 for a Notre Dame game that started at 1:30.”

Another bonus was the fact the Notre Dame game lasted longer than usual, delaying the start of WLBZ’s 6 p.m. newscast a half-hour. The other local network affiliate, WVII (Ch. 7), has no weekend newscasts and also had a college game on. Even when WLBZ’s newscast came on, it was matched, 9 rating for 9 rating, by the C game.

“That’s excellent. That doesn’t happen normally,” Hiltz explained. “The only time period we didn’t win was ‘Bill Green’s Maine’ [7-7:30 p.m.].”

The live broadcasts of all three state championship football games occurred during one of five annual Nielsen TV ratings “sweeps” periods and thus provided a rare opportunity for officials at the CBS affiliate to get hard ratings numbers for a local sports telecast.

“We usually get one or two UMaine events measured by Nielsen numbers each year, but the chance to measure a high school telecast? This is pretty much it for us now,” said Hiltz.

The only other opportunities for WABI to get ratings for high school sportscasts was back when the station aired the Eastern Maine Class A basketball tournament quarterfinals in early March. The station ended a 50-year run of high school tourney basketball broadcasts in 2003.

Since ad support was solid for all three football broadcasts and public reaction was positive, the numbers appear to make it a good bet for a long return.

“We haven’t had an overall assessment because we just got these numbers today, but preliminarily we’re very happy with the numbers,” Hiltz said. “Scheduling and advertising support are the only two remaining factors for next year.”

Bears skate onto broadband

B2 Networks – a national provider of international television and video broadcasting systems, pay-per-view, and billing systems – will broadcast all four games from the Florida College Hockey Classic, including both of the University of Maine’s games, live from Estero, Fla., Tuesday and Wednesday.

Fans wanting to see the games must have a high-speed Internet connection and Windows Media Player 9.0 or higher on their computers to access the games via the B2 Web site (www.B2now.com). Each game costs $8 and can also be accessed through the UMaine Web site (goblackbears.com). A portion of each pay-per-view Webcast will be given to the participating universities.

Maine’s game against Minnesota-Duluth will air at 7:35 p.m. Tuesday while the other game pits Cornell against Northeastern at 4:05 p.m. The consolation and championship games will air at 4:05 p.m. and 7:35 p.m., respectively, on Wednesday. This is the first time in its six-year history that the event has been carried live via broadband worldwide.

The Las Vegas-headquartered B2 also airs AHL, ECHL, UHL and USHL hockey action as well as Triple-A Pacific Coast League baseball and National Lacrosse League games.

Andrew Neff can be reached at 990-8205, 1-800-310-8600 or at aneff@bangordailynews.net