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Local Nielsen ratings snapshot (Fri.-Sun., Aug. 24-26) -- Cowboys inch up, Rangers remain solid

By ED BARK
@unclebarkycom
Saturday night's "dress rehearsal" pre-season game between the injury-riddled Cowboys and woeful Rams split the difference ratings-wise between the first two pretenders.

Running until almost 11:15 p.m. on CBS11, the 20-19 win over St. Louis averaged 582,573 D-FW viewers. That's up from the 541,928 who watched Game 2 against San Diego but down from the pre-season opener crowd of 629,992 for that thrilling 3-0 win at Oakland.

ABC's competing NASCAR race drove into second place in the prime-time Nielsens with 94,837 viewers while NBC's one-hour Wrestlemania special managed 74,515 viewers from 8 to 9 p.m.

Earlier Saturday, the Texas Rangers' afternoon thumping of the Twins drew a nice-sized 243,868 viewers on Fox.

The Rangers' Sunday afternoon ratings were muddled by a lengthy rain delay that stretched the game into the early evening on Fox Sports Southwest. The peak audience for the Rangers' 6-5 loss came between 6:15 and 6:45 p.m., when 298,060 watched. That was a bit better than the 277,738 viewers for NBC's pre-season Sunday Night Football matchup between the Jets and Panthers.

Friday night's Rangers-Twins game on TXA21 easily paced all prime-time programming with 216,771 viewers opposite CBS' Bears-Giants exhibition (142,256 viewers).

In Friday's local news derby results, WFAA8 notched a 10 p.m. win in total viewers but bowed to Fox4 among 25-to-54-year-olds, the main advertiser target audience for news programming.

WFAA8 narrowly won at 6 a.m. in both ratings measurements and added a more dominant 6 p.m. sweep.

NBC5 took both golds at 5 p.m.