no Kate Rinklerkthere is no rating history.
The NCAA Women’s Basketball Tournament Final Four saw a sharp decline in television ratings from last year’s record viewers. With Clark not in the tournament, the UConn vs UCLA and South Carolina vs Texas broadcasts averaged 3.9 million viewers on ESPN. This showed a 64% drop from the 2024 record-setting 10.8 million viewers. Front Office Sports.
Still, without Clark, this year’s Final Four is the second most seen in history, and even improved from the 2023 edition featuring Clark.
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University of Iowa Hawkeyes guard Kate Rinklark cheered just like her teammates at the University of Nebraska Cornhuskers game at the Big Ten Women’s Basketball Championship at the Big Ten Women’s Basketball Championship in Minneapolis on March 10, 2024. (Angelina Katsanis/Star Tribune via Getty Images)
However, Clark’s popularity as a college player helped the sport peak with historic perceptions last year. The women’s championship game between the Iowa team and Dawnstaley’s South Carolina has had a better rating than the men’s championship game for the first time ever.
With Clark in the WNBA, the Pro League benefited from its popularity surge in 2024.
Clark became the most viewed team in the WNBA due to landslides Her newcomer yearall 14 most viewed WNBA games of the season included fever. On top of that, she broke records with most All-Star votes for every player in WNBA history.
Internal Kate Linklark’s impact on men’s basketball
Indiana Fever Guard Kate Rinklark will face the Dallas Wings of Indianapolis on September 15th, 2024. (AP photo/Michael Conroy, File)
In early September, Clark’s Indiana Fever played in front of a television audience of 1.26 million viewers in a game against the Minnesota Links, which was played at the same time as the weekly Friday night NFL game between the Philadelphia Eagles and Green Bay Packers.
In Clark’s first regular-season finale against Washington’s mystics on September 19, 20,711 fans who appeared at Capital One Arena set a new record for the best WNBA regular-season contest.
Clark drew a WNBA record It competed against NFL Sunday, with 1.84 million viewers for its first playoff game against the Connecticut Sun on September 22nd. She followed it with another record audience of 2.54 million viewers for Game 2.
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Kate Linklark of Indiana Fever was in discussion with the media at an introductory press conference held at Gainbridge Field House in Indianapolis on April 17, 2024. (Ron Hoskins/nbae via Getty Images)
However, after Clark’s fever season ended, the WNBA playoffs brought a sharp decline in viewers.
The first game between Ace and Liberty was last year’s WNBA Finals rematch between the two most popular successful teams in the league, attracting just 929,000 audiences.
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