Most-Watched March Madness in Four Years: NCAA Number of Day

(Bloomberg) -- 6.4.

That's the average television rating for the first two rounds of the NCAA men's basketball tournament. It's the second-largest audience leading into the Sweet 16 since the tournament moved to the current television format in 1991.

In plain English, that means on average 6.4 percent of homes in the country's top markets have been tuned in to tournament coverage on CBS, TBS, TNT and TruTV. That's up 8.5 percent from last year, according to CBS. The only year with a higher average rating through the first two rounds was 2015, when the tournament drew a 6.7.

The strong viewership underscores a counterintuitive point about the tournament. Even though the public likes to see upsets and tight games, ratings are usually driven by the number of prestige teams that are playing. This tournament has been almost entirely devoid of upsets -- the only remaining team seeded lower than No. 5 is Oregon, which has a $120 million athletics budget -- and the average margin of victory is 14.2 points, the most this century.

Previous Numbers of the Day

To contact the reporter on this story: Eben Novy-Williams in New York at enovywilliam@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Nick Turner at nturner7@bloomberg.net, Rob Golum

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