Monday's second round NCAA women's tournament matchup between the No. 1 seed Hawkeyes and No. 8 seed West Virginia Mountaineers, broadcast by ESPN, averaged 4.9 million viewers, marking the largest pre-Final Four audience in women's March Madness, Sports Media Watch reported Tuesday.
In comparison, Iowa's first-round victory over No. 16 seed Holy Cross drew 3.2 millions viewers to ABC Saturday, becoming the most-viewed first round game on record, ESPN announced. The weekend's slate of games across ESPN platforms was the most-consumed first round of the NCAA women's tournament ever, with 1.5 billion minutes watched, ESPN said.
For all the hype about Clark, however, Iowa isn’t the only team to put up big numbers thus far. Leading into Monday night’s WVU-Iowa battle, the 6 p.m. ET UConn-Syracuse game averaged just shy of 2.1 million viewers, while LSU’s 83-56 blowout of Middle Tennessee on Sunday also topped the 2 million mark.