The opening week of the college football season dominated the sports ratings chart last week, securing the top 10 most-watched telecasts.
The onslaught was led by ABC’s September 3 LSU-Florida State telecast, which pulled in 9.16 million viewers -- the network’s second-best regular season game in the past five years, according to Nielsen ratings published by SportsMedia Watch. Fox’s September 2 Colorado-Christian University telecast – which marked former NFL star Deion Sanders’ debut as Colorado coach – finished second for the week with 7.26 million viewers.
Among non-college football telecasts, USA Network’s September 3 NASCAR Cup playoff race from Darlington topped the list with 2.28 million viewers, followed by ABC’s September 3 coverage of US Open tennis and Fox’s September 2 Saturday baseball telecast, which drew 1.92 million viewers.
| Date | Event | Network | Viewers |
| September 3 | College football – LSU-Florida State | ABC | 9.16 million |
| September 2 | College football – Colorado-Christian University | Fox | 7.26 million |
| September 2 | College football – Ohio State-Indiana | CBS | 4.64 million |
| September 2 | College football – West Virginia-Penn State | NBC | 3.49 million |
| August 31 | College football – Nebraska-Minnesota | Fox | 3.49 million |
| September 2 | College football – North Carolina-South Carolina | ABC | 3.40 million |
| September 3 | College football – Oregon State-San Jose St | CBS | 3.23 million |
| September 2 | College football – Rice-University-Texas | Fox | 3.21 million |
| August 31 | College football – Florida-Utah | ESPN | 3.18 million |
| September 3 | College football – Northwestern-Rutgers | CBS | 2.67 million |
