Bowl Ratings---MAC Style

Here's a great post on Bowl Ratings from the Wiz of Odds. Overall, bowl viewership was up 3%. As it relates to the MAC....

In news that no doubt will draw a sigh of relief in Kalamazoo, the Rice and WMU Texas Bowl Game on NFL Network drew virtually no viewers.

Overall ranks, of 34 games:

• Motor City 24th
• International 27th
• GMAC 27th
• Independence 30th
• Texas 33rd

You might be surprised at the Motor City Bowl, with its oh-so-unappealing-matchup, leading the pack. I just think that day after Christmas slot is perfect, and people are starving for something to watch. It was still 9% down from last year.

Ratings were significantly (70%) higher for Ball State than for the Falcon-Tulsa matchup last year. That's a Nate Davis premium.

The International Bowl was up 29% over last year, when Ball State was actually in the game. No explanation, other than possibly having a metro area included (Buffalo).

The Texas Bowl was down 67%, the largest decline by far for any game....which is good news in Kalamazoo.

Finally, there is a graph that shows the rankings for each conference. There are three conferences which did not reach a 2.0 rating on average for its bowls. No surprises...the MAC, the Sun Belt, and Conference USA. So, when we want to know why we don't get bowl bids over Big 10 teams, even when the Big 10 teams blow, here's why.