Michigan football involved in three of the most-watched games in 2021
The old saying is that nobody puts rear-ends in seats like the Michigan football program does. That was certainly the case throughout college football’s 2021 regular season.
Michigan was involved in three of the five most-watched games of the season, headlined by the 42-27 win over Ohio State on Nov. 27. The contest drew nearly 16 million viewers to FOX’s Big Noon Saturday finale to make it the most-viewed contest of the season.
Alabama football’s SEC Championship win over the Georgia Bulldogs ranked second with 15.2 million viewers on CBS. Michigan will face Georgia in the College Football Playoff and play the winner of Alabama vs. Cincinnati. The Crimson Tide’s win at Auburn on Nov. 27 attracted 10.37 million watchers across the country.
The Wolverines’ Big Ten Championship win over Iowa drew in 11.65 million viewers. Oct. 30’s 37-33 loss at Michigan State ranked fifth among games this season with an audience of 9.29 million.
How Michigan could affect next TV deal
Michigan’s resurgence as a national power could pay dividends for the Big Ten in negotiating the next television deal. The brand and alumni base makes them ripe for huge television ratings.
Andrew Marchand and John Ourand discussed this in a recent episode of the “The Marchand and Ourand Sports Media Podcast.”
“Look at the numbers that Ohio State-Michigan did for Fox,” Ourand said. “Fox is crowing about its big new strategy. The noon window on Saturday is the most-viewed window of the regular college football season, and that’s Fox’s strategy of putting the biggest games there. It just so happens those biggest games are all in the Big Ten. The Big Ten is coming into this media rights negotiation with such a position of strength. They have big brands and big ratings. They still have another two years, I believe, that’s left on [their current deal] but I expect them to start negotiations coming this year.
“And I expect Fox, which owns a little more than half the Big Ten Network, to be very aggressive to try to get the whole thing. I expect ESPN to be very aggressive to keep it. I expect CBS, which is losing the SEC in that late Saturday afternoon window, I expect them to be very aggressive to try to get it. WarnerMedia…look how aggressive WarnerMedia was for the Premier League. I expect all of the regular TV networks, aside from NBC… I know there’s gonna be a lot of interest in it and that’s gonna make the rates go to stratospheric levels.”
Michigan’s next game will be Dec. 31 at the Orange Bowl in Miami in a College Football Playoff semifinal against Georgia. That game will kick off at 7:30 p.m. ET on ESPN.
