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One week after being bumped to cable by college football, WWE was back on FOX last Friday. College football was still part of the equation on Dec. 1 though, with SmackDown going head-to-head with a conference championship game with huge national playoff implications.
According to Wrestlenomics, the most recent SmackDown was watched by 2,044,000 total viewers and did a .59 rating with 18-49 year olds. Both numbers are down from the previous broadcast episode. The overall audience figure is the lowest SmackDown’s done on FOX in the past 12 months. You have to go back to Aug. 26, 2022 and the last time the show’s viewership was below two million for a smaller number. The demo rating doesn’t have the same distinction, and is actually the second best the blue show’s had on FOX in the past month. It’s a similar year-over-year pattern; compared to early December 2022, last Friday’s viewership is down while the rating is up.
Other factors certainly came into play — including but not limited to no CM Punk follow-up being teased for last week’s SmackDown like it was for Raw. But the Pac 12 title game between Oregon and Washington was a big one. ESPN PR says ABC’s broadcast of the Huskies win over the Ducks was one of the most watched college games of the year, with more than 9 million tuning in to see Washington win the conference’s last title and secure a spot in the Playoff.
SmackDown won’t have competition from anything that major this Friday, and will have Punk. We’ll see how that works out for them. In the meantime, here’s a rundown of the past year’s worth of SmackDown’s numbers:
* Aired on FS1
For complete results