College Basketball TV Ratings: Most-watched men’s conference championship games

The final weekend before the NCAA tournament saw the last wave of conference tournaments. It became an especially big weekend of college basketball for CBS, which drew historic TV ratings for the Big Ten title game between Purdue and Michigan.

Sunday’s Big Ten tournament championship was the most-watched game of championship week, topping the ACC title game, which aired Saturday night. CBS also got a big win for its Selection Show with an average of 6.41 million viewers tuning in – the most since 2014. Additionally, the Big Ten semifinals were the two most-watched games outside of the championship games.

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ESPN also got more than 4 million viewers for the ACC title game, which saw Duke take down Virginia. Here are the most-watched conference championship games for the 2025-26 men’s college basketball season, per Nielsen Big Data + Panel TV ratings data obtained by On3.

Big Ten: Purdue vs. Michigan

Date/Time: March 15, 3:30 p.m. ET
Channel: CBS
Viewers: 4.72 million

At 4.72 million, Purdue’s win over Michigan became the most-watched Big Ten men’s basketball conference championship on record, topping the previous mark of 4.65 million in 2013. The Boilermakers were able to take control in the second half to take down the top-seeded Wolverines at the United Center in Chicago.

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ACC: Virginia vs. Duke

Date/Time: March 14, 8:30 p.m. ET
Channel: ESPN
Viewers: 4.09 million

Duke’s win over Virginia became the second-most watched ACC men’s basketball championship on record, according to ESPN. An average of 4.09 million viewers tuned in as the Blue Devils secured a second straight conference title with a win over UVA.

Big 12: Houston vs. Arizona

Date/Time: March 14, 6 p.m. ET
Channel: ESPN
Viewers: 3.10 million

For the second straight year, it was Houston vs. Arizona for the Big 12 title. This time, the Wildcats got the win in front of 3.1 million viewers on Saturday night, which became the most-watched Big 12…

Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/articles/college-basketball-tv-ratings-most-003047207.html

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Publish date : 2026-03-19 00:30:00

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