An absent Ed Sheeran was the big winner at the Billboard Music Awards (2.1/8) last night, when Janet Jackson took home the Icon Award and Texas-born host Kelly Clarkson railed the lack of action on gun violence in America after the latest school shooting.
In another year of falls among adults 18-49, the three-hour NBC awards show topped Sunday’s primetime but hit an all-time low in fast affiliates, with a 9% dip from last year’s previous low on ABC. Now facing American Idol (1.3/5) on ABC — the music competition series dived 24% from its May 13 show — the Billboard Music Awards also had to take on a triumphant Golden State Warriors and Game 3 of the Western Conference Finals on cable.
A resounding 125-83 thrashing of the Houston Rockets by Steph Curry and crew put the Warriors ahead 2-1 in the NBA playoff series, and put TNT in the top spot of all of cable with a 5.8 rating in metered market results. That is up 26% from the comparable game of 2017’s Western Conference Finals, when current champs the Warriors topped the San Antonio Spurs. The Warriors and Rockets meet for this year’s Game 4 on Tuesday.
Starting the night with a special Dateline (0.9/4), NBC won the battle of the Big 4 on Sunday with a 1.8/7 among 18-49s and 6.49 million total viewers. For you math-heads, that marks a 38% jump on the net’s fourth-place position of last week.
Up against music and sports action, the Fox-canceled and NBC-resurrected Brooklyn Nine-Nine (0.8/3) ended its fifth season Sunday. Breaking the common trend of recent years, the cop comedy was not only even with its May 13 airing but up 33% from its Season 4 ender of May 23 last year, a Tuesday.
The rest of Fox’s night saw season finales of The Simpsons (0.8/3) and Family Guy (0.9/4) that were down a tenth apiece. A double dose of Bob’s Burgers at 7:30 PM (0.7/3) and a season finale at 9:30 PM (0.8/3) matched last week.
A two-hour NCIS: Los Angeles (0.8/3) Season 9 finale was even with the procedural’s May 13 show but was down 33% from its Season 8 ender of May 14 last year to some of the worst numbers the CBS series has seen. With POTUS ambitions declared, Madam Secretary (0.6/3) was also the same as last week, as was 7 PM’s 60 Minutes (0.8/4). The Tea Leoni-led political drama also took a finale bite with a decline of a tenth from its Season 3 ender of May 21, 2017.
Bookending Idol, ABC’s Sunday had an America’s Funniest Home Videos (0.9/4) finale that slid 25% from last week and Deception (0.6/3) which was down a tenth from the now-canceled series’ final original.
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