Friday's Unrivaled 3×3 Basketball debut was an unequivocal success for TV partner TNT Sports, as the new offseason 3x3 league's opening lineup became the most-watched women's basketball games in the broadcast network's history.
The doubleheader logged viewership averages of 313,000 and 311,000, respectively, with the first game peaking at 364,000.
Notably, these numbers do not include viewers on Max, where every Unrivaled game is available to stream live under the league's six-year, $100 million media deal with Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD).
In 2022, WNBA games averaged 372,000 viewers across Disney networks, with the league later surpassing 500,000 across ABC, ESPN, and CBS in 2023 before reaching a 1.19 million average on ESPN in 2024.
Unlike the well-established WNBA, which is on the cusp of entering its 29th year, Unrivaled is a new-look product in its first-ever season. With that in mind, Unrivaled's initial numbers are promising, particularly for a league that's prioritizing long-term wins over instant gratification.
"I think we put ourselves in a great position to be successful right away, but it’s a marathon," league president Alex Bazzell told The Athletic before Unrivaled’s launch. "We’re not running out there from Day 1 trying to get millions of viewers out of the gate."
One piece of the Unrivaled fan engagement puzzle
Viewership is just one way the league is measuring fan engagement, with Unrivaled also turning an eye toward social media metrics.
"[Viewership is] not fully indicative of what is the overall fan interest because there’s so many ways to consume leagues and teams and highlights," noted Bazzell.
It's one reason that partnering with WBD was so appealing to the new league. The media giant's already robust sports social media channels are elevating Unrivaled content across platforms to an established, sports-hungry audience.
To that end, Unrivaled’s opening weekend content garnered 31 million views across WBD’s social channels and fueled a 59% viewership boost of the media giant's women's sports-specific TikTok account.
Last week's blockbuster Top-10 matchup between No. 2 UConn and No. 8 Notre Dame scored ESPN their highest ratings of the young NCAA women's basketball season, averaging 847,000 viewers while peaking at 915,000 during the Thursday evening broadcast.
Notre Dame's big 79-68 win also marked the largest viewing audience for a pre-January NCAA women's basketball game on ESPN since 2011.
College basketball's record-breaking growth continues
Breaking viewership records is nothing new on the college basketball court. Later rounds of the NCAA tournament draw millions, with last year's national championship game scoring 18.9 million viewers to become ESPN's most-watched college basketball game ever, men's or women's.
That said, recent years have seen significant growth in regular-season play, too. The 2022-23 campaign averaged audiences of almost 200,000 across ESPN's platforms, an increase of 11% year-over-year. Last season upped the ante, averaging 272,000 viewers in regular-season play for a 37% increase over 2022-23. That bump made the 2023-24 season ESPN's most-watched in 15 years.
Even more, 2023-24 regular-season play on ESPN and ABC garnered 476,000 viewers per game, with 13 games drawing over 500,000 — the most to ever surpass that mark in a single season.
With Thursday's tilt between the Irish and the Huskies drawing 78% more viewers than last season's ESPN and ABC average, college basketball isn't slowing down — it's ramping up.
Top stars fuel NCAA basketball viewership records
The NCAA's Caitlin Clark era is over, but stars like Notre Dame's Hannah Hidalgo and UConn's Paige Bueckers are fueling the demand for college basketball. These individual players' talent and skills, combined with massive recognition birthed by the NIL era across college sports, have allowed top athletes to build brands and fan followings that rival the pros.
Considering Bueckers and other college stars like USC's JuJu Watkins feature in national ad campaigns for huge companies like Nike and State Farm nearly as often as they top the NCAA's stat sheet, it's no wonder they've become household names that hundreds of thousands want to watch in action.