NBC’s Indianapolis-Tennessee NFL matchup led most of the night with 13.8 million viewers, and CBS scored early Sunday night thanks mostly to its Sunday afternoon football spilling over into primetime, according to early Nielsen estimates. That overrun boosted The Amazing Race to 13.1 million viewers (up 3.2 million from last week). But the net’s new medical drama Three Rivers flatlined at 9 p.m. with 9 million viewers, blowing nearly a third of that Race lead-in audience (though it was off only about 200,000 from its disappointing debut numbers); that didn’t do much to help Cold Case at 10 p.m., which dropped 25 percent from last week to 7.3 million. Fox’s animated lineup dropped a bit from last week, with the entire Simpsons/Cleveland Show/Family Guy/American Dad block down about 12 percent from last week.
| Time | Show | Viewers (in millions) |
|---|---|---|
| 7 p.m. | NFL overrun (CBS) Football Night in America (NBC) The Cleveland Show (Fox) |
20.7 6.5 2.9 (repeat) |
| 7:30 p.m. | America’s Funniest Home Videos (ABC) American Dad (Fox) |
7.4 3.8 (repeat) |
| 8 p.m. | Sunday Night Football (NBC) The Amazing Race XV (CBS) Extreme Makeover: Home Edition (ABC) The Simpsons (Fox) |
13.8 13.1 9.8 7.5 |
| 8:30 p.m. | The Cleveland Show (Fox) | 7.8 |
| 9 p.m. | Desperate Housewives (ABC) Three Rivers (CBS) Family Guy (Fox) |
13.1 9.0 8.9 |
| 9:30 p.m. | American Dad (Fox) | 6.7 |
| 10 p.m. | Brothers & Sisters (ABC) Cold Case (CBS) |
9.0 7.3 |
Comments (1-15) of 28 Add your comment
If you want to see an amazing race, you should see me driving home after a meal at a Mexican restaurant.
I don’t always win, though. Thank you, Resolve!
Chipotlaway…will get the blood out of your underwear right quick harry…
Nice.
I was wondering how they dealt with the fact that the shows on CBS on Sunday night all run late due football running over week in and week out. Why isn’t the Amazing Race in the 9pm timeslot, since that’s when it actually aired this week?
It was nice of CBS to flip Three Rivers and Cold Case – don’t know if it helped enough.
It looks good, but I got the feeling that I’d seen most of this material before. Patients come in, some live, some die. It’s kind of like the Love Boat, but without the boat drinks and laugh track.
I am a big fan of Alex O’Loughlin and I loved Moonlight, but Three Rivers wastes his talents. I hope that he will find a better show, as I don’t think this one will be around long.
Ditto!
Can I just ask a question? Football spilling over into 60 Minutes, which in turns messes up the rest of Sunday night programming has been a problem on CBS for 20 years! Why can’t they do something about this? It’s not like it happens once in a blue moon. It happens every Sunday during football season and it has been this way for my entire life. FOX is smart: they schedule a 1-hour post-game program between 7-8pm, as a buffer, so in case football spills over, they can just chuck that show and go right into their 8pm programming at 8pm. CBS, are you paying attention? This used to mess up my VHS. Now, it messes up my DVR and I’m sure it messes with countless old people’s bed times!
Amen and ditto that. Most of the afternoon games start at 4:15 est, and with the commercials there is no way the game will end before 7:30. That’s part of why I stopped watching CBS on Sun. night, I got tired of record every program and for an extra hour after just to see one or two. CBS needs to come up with a show called “16 minutes” to run during football season.
oops – recording
I have noticed this since the ’80s. CBS has always gone over its 7 pm slot with its football games and 60 Minutes started at maybe 7:30 or 7:45. Even affected the Emmy Awards on Sept 20th, when that football game went over. They should end the football coverage at 6:57 whether it hasn’t ended or not,show the remainder of the game on video on their CBS Sports website (hellooooo, people use the Internet now to see football highlights and results or switch to ESPN’s SportsCenter!) and go straight to 60 Minutes at 7 pm and start it on time!
I think that is a horrible idea. Football consistantly wins in the rating and those people are not going to want to watch the game online or see it on video later. I agree with CBS needs to change somethings to make the programming work better but stopping in the middle of a football game will produce nothing but millions of angry people.
The NFL has rules going back at least 30 years that dicate an entire game must be shown regardless of the score. Remember the “Heidi” fiasco from the 70’s?
Why is it that Three Rivers is considered a disappointment and Brothers and Sisters is not when they both have the same amount of viewers?
Good question.
Because Brothers and Sisters has been on for a bajillion years and Three Rivers is a brand new show. Think: how much marketing have you seen for Three Rivers? Now, how much have you seen for Brothers & Sisters? That’s the difference. Plus, Brothers & Sisters gets Emmy attention, something Three Rivers will almost inevitably not do.
i consider B&S a major disappointment. Like Three Rivers, it also has a very talented cast, but the story lines just aren’t very interesting.
What with True Blood, Vampire Diaries, and Twilight don’t you know CBS is kicking themselves over canceling Moonlight?
Cold Case is fast heading for cancellation.
I disagree, it’s the stupid games and the change in the time slot, I think personally CBS should put Three Rivers on at Ten, and move CC back to 9pm
Three Rivers is gonna kill Cold Case.
I think CBS is doing a great job by airing their shows even if they run over their air time due to football. That way everyone is happy cause they get to see their show anyway!!
CBS should cancel “Three Rivers”…a one-note show if ever there was one…and pick up SOUTHLAND from NBC! PRONTO! Plus, NFL football running over into Primetime = Boffo ratings, so don’t look for that situation to be “fixed” anytime soon…..same for FOX.
i suffer through three rivers b/c i like cold case. i was so confused this week…i think they showed the pilot as the 2nd episode. very odd. i actually liked it better than the “first” episode. but, it is killing cold case so get rid of it! bring back sundays, football to amazing race to cold case. get rid of 60 minutes too!
“Three Rivers” has the potential to be a success for CBS but the time slot definitely has to be changed. A 45 minute delay because of a football game will not keep the viewer very long. Hope CBS puts more effort into promoting “Three Rivers” the way they seem to be promoting other new shows like “The Good Wife” and “NCIS Los Angeles” – CBS has a habit of cancelling shows without giving them a fighting chance, i.e. “Moonlight” Hope “Three Rivers” gets that chance.
I loved the idea of “16 minutes” – I’ve often lamented that CBS would not cut segments of 60 minutes when sports runs overlong. (Not just NFL – PGA too.) Or they could do the postgame buffer like FOX or shift 60 minutes to the pre-news position at 10/9 and let AR & CC lead off. I don’t expect to see TR last long, especially when the actors can’t even pronounce the names of the three rivers! (But they’re hoping these overruns will force us to tolerate it, considering we have to set our DVRS to record 5 hours of CBS on Sunday night whether we want it all or not.) ERRGGG. Been a pet peeve my whole fricking life, and I’m a boomer, so that’s saying something. P.S. I liked AL in Moonlight much better than TR. They were just stupid to dump that show.
P.S. I’m not even into the whole vampire thing (although I do watch the occasional ep of TB b/c it’s just good TV) but I STILL liked Moonlight better than TR. (Boy they must kicking themselves at CBS, having anticipated the vampire boom and then blowing it.)