THE Ohio State Buckeyes won a brilliant National Championship on Monday night with a win over the Notre Dame Fighting Irish.
But while the game saw drama, it was far from a ratings winner for ESPN.
The National Championship game struggled to bring in viewers on Monday night
This was the first year of the expanded college football playoffs, with 12 teams competing for the big prize.
But, according to Sports Media Watch, the 2025 edition was the fifth-WORST viewed National Championship game in 27 years – in stark contrast to soaring ticket prices.
Nielsen-rated ESPN networks have been tracked since the start of the Bowl Championship series in 1998.
The 34-23 win for the Buckeyes drew an average crowd of only 22.1 million, however, a 12.1% decline from last year.
The game was broadcast on local ESPN cable networks but not on ABC.
It was still the most-watched college game of the season and the highest non-NFL sporting event since the last Super Bowl.
It was also only the second time in the last five years that the title game has been the most-watched of the college season.
The game peaked early with 26.1 million viewers tuning in at around 8.30pm ET.
Accoriding to Sports Media Watch, three of least-watched title games have come in the last five years.
After this one, Alabama vs Ohio State in 2021 averaged 19.1 million and Georgia’s blowout win over TCU in 2023 averaged just 17.2 million viewers.
Analysts believe that the expanded format has had an impact on ratings, with football fans not used to watching college ball in late January.
This is also when the NFL season is starting to peak.
The game came on the Monday after the Divisional Round, where there were back-to-back games on Saturday and Sunday.
The game itself is expected to have impacted the viewing numbers, with Ohio State mounting a 31-7 lead before a late Notre Dame comeback fell short.
Donald Trump’s presidential inauguration also took place on Monday.
After the game, Ohio State head coach Ryan Day said: “It wasn’t like at the end of the year we were broken, it wasn’t that way.
College football’s 2024 shake-up
Oklahoma and Texas switching from the Big 12 to the SEC is one of the biggest changes to college football in recent times.
And that has set off a chain reaction which has left the Pac-12 conference decimated.
The Pac-12 has lost 10 of its 12 members and is down to just Oregon State and Washington State.
Four of those teams are headed for the Big 12 – Arizona, Arizona State, Colorado and Utah.
Another four are going to the Big 10 – Oregon, UCLA, USC and Washington.
And the other two teams, California and Stanford, will join the ACC conference.
No teams have left the SEC, Big Ten or ACC.
“We had an awful day. I don’t know how else to describe it.
“We had an awful day, and we just said we could never do that again, and I think it’s the job of the head coach to take the responsibility when something goes bad like that.”
Day netted a $1 million winning bonus for capturing the national title.
That’s on top of his $10 million annual salary.
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