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Local Nielsen ratings snapshot (Tues., April 1) -- the address is CBS despite wealth of competing sports attractions

By ED BARK
@unclebarkycom on Twitter
CBS and NCIS again ruled Tuesday’s prime-time landscape, with the network’s following crime dramas also scoring big against tightly contested games involving the Texas Rangers, Dallas Mavericks and SMU Mustangs.

NCIS led off the night with 489,990 D-FW viewers before NCIS: Los Angeles (355,065) and Person of Interest (276,951) also won their time slots.

NBC’s 7 p.m. hour of The Voice as usual outdrew NCIS among advertiser-prized 18-to-49-year-olds, but NCIS: Los Angeles and Person of Interest held serve in this key demographic.

Meanwhile, the Mavericks lost another key game in overtime, this time to the visiting Golden State Warriors. but the Rangers won in the ninth inning on a walk-off hit by Adrian Beltre. The Mavs were shifted to TXA21 to make room for the Rangers on Fox Sports Southwest. And SMU, which staged a big comeback to beat Clemson in the first of two NIT semi-final games, wound up on ESPN2 to accommodate the NCAA women’s basketball tournament on mothership ESPN.

The Rangers game, which stretched until 10:19 p.m., averaged 149,127 total viewers to draw the biggest crowd in this sports universe. The Mavericks game, which ended at 10:10 p.m., came in second with 85,216 viewers. As for the Mustangs, well, they played in relative obscurity with a paltry 21,304 viewers.

The Rangers also comfortably beat the Mavericks among 18-to-49-year-olds by a score of 68,391 to 39,080. This defies the conventional wisdom that only Grandpappy Amos watches baseball anymore. SMU lured a sub-pitiful 1,303 viewers in the 18-to-49 demographic, according to Nielsen Media Research.

The Mustangs will now play Minnesota for the NIT title on Thursday night. Ratings for that game can’t help but improve.

Conan O’Brien’s second Conan from Dallas initially went into the teeth of both the Rangers and the Mavericks. It emerged bloodied with an average of just 28,405 total viewers for the full 10 p.m. hour. That’s a significant dip from the 78,114 viewers for Monday’s opening night from Dallas’ downtown Majestic Theater.

Here are Tuesday’s local news derby results.

WFAA8 had the most total viewers at 10 p.m., but NBC5 ran first with 25-to-54-year-olds (main advertiser target audience for news programming).

Fox4 ran the table at 6 a.m. and NBC5 did likewise at 5 p.m. The Peacock also had the most total viewers at 6 p.m. while sharing first place in the 25-to-54 demographic with Fox4 and WFAA8.

LOCAL NEWS NOTE

WFAA8 anchor John McCaa won’t be gone nearly as long as his automated email reply caused some viewers to fear.

McCaa, who was vacationing in South America, said a “screwup” had him returning in August when it should have said April. He’s due back on WFAA8’s 6 and 10 p.m. newscasts on Wednesday, April 2nd.

“I took the break now because I am about to start my re-write of my (PhD) dissertation,” McCaa told unclebarky.com. “Likely to take several months -- plus work!”

Email comments or questions to: unclebarky@verizon.net