National Football League

'Idol,' football score week's Nielsen win for Fox

Published Jan. 22, 2014 7:17 p.m. ET

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NEW YORK (AP) Last week, it was Fox's turn to shine.

Rebounding from a fourth-place finish the previous week, Fox rode football and ''American Idol'' to the top of the prime-time ratings, according to Nielsen.

Fox's coverage of the NFC championship game between the Seattle Seahawks and the San Francisco 49ers drew a hefty 56 million viewers to take the top slot for the week, followed by the game's overtime show, which attracted more than 30 million viewers.

The Wednesday season premiere of ''American Idol,'' seen by 15 million viewers, placed fifth for the week, followed right behind by the Thursday ''Idol'' edition, with more than 13 million viewers.

Fox's slasher drama ''The Following'' made a strong second-season return in 10th place, with 11 million viewers tuning in.

CBS claimed the other five slots in the Top 10 roster.

Overall for the week, Fox won with an average of 17.2 million viewers. Runner-up CBS had 8.4 million, followed by ABC with 5.2 million and NBC with 4.6 million. Univision had 2.7 million, the CW had 1.6 viewers, Telemundo had 1.4 million and ION Television had 1.2 million.

The week's top-rated cable networks were Disney with 2.24 million viewers, USA with 2.18 million and History with 1.98 million.

NBC's ''Nightly News'' topped the evening newscasts with an average of 9.4 million viewers. ABC's ''World News'' was second with 8.5 million and the ''CBS Evening News'' had 7.5 million viewers.

For the week of Jan. 13-19, the top 10 shows, their networks and viewerships: NFC Championship: San Francisco at Seattle, Fox, 55.91 million; NFC Championship: ''The OT,'' Fox, 30.34 million; ''NCIS,'' CBS, 19.72 million; ''NCIS: Los Angeles,'' CBS, 15.87 million; ''American Idol'' (Wednesday), Fox, 15.19 million; ''American Idol'' (Thursday), Fox, 13.36 million; ''Blue Bloods,'' CBS, 12.62 million; ''Person of Interest,'' CBS, 12.54 million; ''The Big Bang Theory,'' CBS, 12.03 million; ''The Following,'' Fox, 11.18 million.

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ABC and Disney are owned by The Walt Disney Co. CBS is owned by CBS Corp. CW is a joint venture of Warner Bros. Entertainment and CBS Corp. Fox is owned by 21st Century Fox. NBC, USA and Telemundo are owned by Comcast Corp. ION Television is owned by ION Media Networks. History is owned by A+E Networks.

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Online:

http://www.nielsen.com