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Los Angeles Lakers’ Anthony Davis # 3 handles the ball against the Miami Heat during Game One of the NBA Finals on September 30, 2020 in Orlando, Florida at AdventHealth Arena.
Fernando Medina | National Basketball Association | fake images
The National Basketball Association played Game 1 of its Finals with an average of 7.4 million viewers on ABC, its lowest audience for a Finals contest since 1994.
Viewership totals were reported by the Hollywood Reporter. Requests to the NBA and ESPN, which produced the game for ABC, to confirm viewership totals were not returned.
The Disney network generally publishes its audience numbers on its website, but did not do so on Thursday.
The Los Angeles Lakers beat the Miami Heat 116-98, led by forward Anthony Davis, who scored 34 points, the game’s high. The NBA championship matchup features Lakers star LeBron James playing against one of his former teams on the Heat.
James helped lead the Heat to four consecutive Finals appearances from 2010 to 2014.
The first game of the 2020 NBA Finals was Game 1 with the lowest rating since 2007, when the San Antonio Spurs played the Cleveland Cavaliers led by James. It was also the most-watched NBA Finals contest since Game 5 of the Houston Rockets vs New York Knicks series in 1994.
The game, later on NBC, was cut short due to the OJ Simpson car chase. According to Nielsen ratings, the contest registered a 7.8.
Game 1 of the Finals last year between the Golden State Warriors and the Toronto Raptors drew 13.3 million viewers. The NBA set viewership peaks in Canada for the game in 2019, reaching approximately 7.4 million viewers. But those numbers are not counted as an audience in the US.
The NBA will continue its Finals bubble on Friday with Game 2 scheduled to begin at 9 pm ET.
