We're officially halfway into the first season of college football's new era, and so far the 2024 season has played out spectacularly. Perennial favorites Alabama, Georgia and Ohio State have all taken on captivating losses, yet remain in the thick of the race to reach the first 12-team College Football Playoff.
Champions of the 2000s -- Texas and Miami -- are undefeated and ranked in the AP top-6, while 1990s powers Nebraska and Texas A&M have shown long-awaited resurgence. The Heisman Trophy race is led by a Boise State running back and a Colorado wide receiver/defensive back.
Meanwhile, uncertainty abounds. No one knows how the 12-team CFP will unfold and, even still, no postseason contract exists beyond the 2025 season. Various private equity angels/vultures are offering/threatening to buy the sport and streamline/keep the profits that are sure to follow.
No one knows what the future holds, and much of that will be determined by how the present unfolds.
Given that we're at the halfway point of this momentous and unprecedented season, it's time to check in on how college football is performing as a television product. We started this last season and found it a fun and informative project, and so it's time to do it again.
Before we list the top 25 to date, first let's dig into the data.
Appearances by program
4: Georgia
3: Alabama, LSU, Oklahoma, USC
2: Auburn, Colorado, Florida, Florida State, Michigan, Ohio State, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Texas A&M
1: Arkansas, Boston College, Clemson, Georgia Tech, Iowa, Kentucky, Miami, Nebraska, North Dakota State, Notre Dame, Ole Miss, Oregon, Penn State, Wisconsin
Appearances by conference
1. SEC: 28
2. Big Ten: 12
3. ACC: 6
4. Big 12: 2
Viewership is way up for the SEC, who garnered 15 appearances by this point last year. Adding Texas and Oklahoma to the ledger certainly helped (Saturday's Red River Romp still stands as the sixth most-watched game to date), but 13 of the conference's 16 teams make at least one appearance on the list, and that doesn't count one of the two text-your-friends-and-find-the-remote games of the year in Alabama-Vanderbilt, which aired on the unrated SEC Network. (Northern Illinois-Notre Dame was the other.)
The Big Ten has also seen its viewership numbers grow (eight appearances at this point in 2023), thanks in large part to its raid of the Pac-12. The Pac-12 actually accounted for 10 appearances by this point last season, trailing only the SEC's 15.
The SEC and Big Ten's gains have come at the expense of the rest of the power conferences. The most-watched ACC vs. ACC games aired at irregular times (Week Zero; Labor Day), and each game saw one of its marquee brands (Florida State) take damaging losses.
The Big 12, meanwhile, is represented wholly by Colorado. Viewership for the Prime Show is down from Season 1; Colorado was the most-watched team in college football at this point last season. The most-watched Big 12 vs. Big 12 matchup not involving Colorado to date is a Friday night affair between Arizona and Kansas State, which attracted 2.58 million viewers to Fox on Sept. 13.
Appearances by network
ABC: 15
ESPN, CBS: 3
Fox, NBC: 2
As stated above, ABC/ESPN's new all-in deal with the SEC has been good business for both sides. ABC nearly doubled its top-25 games from this point last year (eight). ABC has aired the most-watched game in four of the seven weeks thus far, and its SEC triple-headers routinely retain viewers from noon to night. This week, ABC will air an all-SEC top-12 double header with No. 7 Alabama at No. 11 Tennessee (3:30 p.m. ET) and No. 5 Georgia at No. 1 Texas (7:30 p.m. ET).
Appearances by time slot
Prime: 9
Mid-afternoon: 8
Noon: 6
Weeknight: 2
College football television viewers hold strong opinions about when the "best" games of the day should be played, but the data shows viewers will find compelling college football whenever it's played. Four of the top five games were prime time affairs, but No. 3 was a noon kick, Nos. 6, 9 and 10 were mid-afternoon games, and No. 7 was also a noon game. Last season, the most-watched game of the regular season (Ohio State-Michigan, 19.07 million viewers) aired at noon.
At long last, the 25 most-watched games of the first half of the 2024 college football season (all data via Sports Media Watch).
1. Georgia-Alabama -- 11.99 million (ABC)
2. Ohio State-Oregon -- 9.6 million (NBC)
3. Texas-Michigan -- 9.19 million (Fox)
4. USC-LSU -- 8.62 million (ABC)
5. Notre Dame-Texas A&M -- 7.92 million (ABC)
6. Texas-Oklahoma -- 7.63 million (ABC)
7. Clemson-Georgia -- 7.58 million (ABC)
8. Georgia-Kentucky -- 6.6 million (ABC)
9. Miami-Florida -- 6.35 million (ABC)
10. USC-Michigan -- 6.32 million (CBS)
11. Tennessee-Oklahoma -- 6.27 million (ABC)
12. South Carolina-Alabama -- 6 million (ABC)
13. Colorado-Nebraska -- 5.67 million (NBC)
14. Tennessee-Arkansas -- 5.29 million (ABC)
15. Oklahoma-Auburn -- 5.04 million (ABC)
16. Alabama-Wisconsin -- 5.03 million (Fox)
17. Florida State-Georgia Tech -- 4.99 million (ESPN)
18. LSU-South Carolina -- 4.94 million (ABC)
19. Auburn-Georgia -- 4.93 million (ABC)
20. Texas A&M-Florida -- 4.8 million (ABC)
21. North Dakota State-Colorado -- 4.76 million (ESPN)
22. Iowa-Ohio State -- 4.46 million (CBS)
23. Boston College-Florida State -- 4.44 million (ESPN)
24. Penn State-USC -- 4.28 million (CBS)
25. Ole Miss-LSU -- 4.24 million (ABC)
In total, 28 games topped the 4 million threshold, and three more surpassed 3.9 million. That's up from 26 in 2023, 21 in 2022, 22 in 2021, 20 in 2019, and 18 in 2018.
As always, stay tuned to The Scoop for the latest.