For the weekly overall top cable network rankings, click here.
The Ohio State-Arkansas Sugar Bowl topped the cable viewing week with 13.6 million viewers followed by the Virginia Tech-Stanford Orange Bowl with 10.7 million. Not counting a 6 minute pre-game for the Sugar Bowl, Jersey Shore was third for the week with its season 2.5 premiere averaging over 8.4 million. The season finale of The Closer averaged 6.6 million and Lifetime’s The Craiglist Killer made the top ten with 5.4 million viewers.
Top 25 Basic cable shows for the week ending January 9, 2011:
| Rank | Program | Network | Day | Time | Viewers (000) |
| 1 | OHIO ST/ARKANSAS | ESPN | Tue | 08:35P-12:20A | 13,635 |
| 2 | VIRGINIA TECH/STANFORD | ESPN | Mon | 08:38P-11:38P | 10,682 |
| 3 | BCS BOWL SHOWCASE L | ESPN | Tue | 08:29P-08:35P | 9,021 |
| 4 | JERSEY SHORE 2B | MTV | Thu | 10:00P-11:00P | 8,446 |
| 5 | 2011 VA TECH/STANFORD | ESPN | Mon | 11:38P-11:55P | 7,789 |
| 6 | BCS BOWL SHOWCASE L | ESPN | Mon | 08:29P-08:38P | 7,579 |
| 7 | BCS BOWL STUDIO L | ESPN | Tue | 12:20A-12:36A | 7,059 |
| 8 | CLOSER, THE | TNT | Mon | 09:00P-10:00P | 6,626 |
| 9 | BCS BOWL STUDIO L | ESPN | Tue | 08:00P-08:29P | 6,288 |
| 10 | CRAIGSLIST KILLER, THE | LIFE | Mon | 09:00P-11:00P | 5,391 |
| 11 | BCS BOWL STUDIO L | ESPN | Mon | 08:00P-08:29P | 4,956 |
| 12 | BCS BOWL STUDIO L | ESPN | Mon | 11:55P-12:05A | 4,807 |
| 13 | WWE ENTERTAINMENT | USA | Mon | 10:00P-11:08P | 4,662 |
| 14 | SPONGEBOB | NICK | Fri | 06:00P-06:30P | 4,446 |
| 15 | HANNAH MONTANA FOREVER | DSNY | Sun | 08:00P-08:30P | 4,338 |
| 16 | WWE ENTERTAINMENT | USA | Mon | 09:00P-10:00P | 4,336 |
| 17 | PRETTY LITTLE LIARS | FAM | Mon | 07:58P-09:00P | 4,222 |
| 18 | SPONGEBOB | NICK | Fri | 06:30P-07:00P | 4,182 |
| 19 | VICTORIOUS | NICK | Sat | 08:30P-09:00P | 4,175 |
| 20 | NCIS | USA | Mon | 08:00P-09:00P | 4,111 |
| 21 | SHAKE IT UP | DSNY | Sun | 08:30P-09:00P | 4,071 |
| 22 | SPONGEBOB | NICK | Mon | 06:00P-06:30P | 3,985 |
| 23 | WIZARDS OF WAVERLY PLACE | DSNY | Fri | 08:30P-08:55P | 3,956 |
| 24 | GAME PLAN | DSNY | Mon | 08:00P-10:00P | 3,848 |
| 25 | BIG TIME RUSH | NICK | Sat | 08:00P-08:30P | 3,807 |
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We always post whatever specific show data we received directly and see via press release or other trade publications. You can subscribe to our RSS feed and we have created a special category (Overnight Cable TV Show Ratings) to group the data we typically post each weekday from @TravisYanan on Twitter. During the week Travis usually posts selected cable results for each weekday, usually late in the afternoon on the east coast (and Friday night data isn’t posted until Monday) and he posts the links to that info on his Twitter account to the info on Marc Berman’s PI Forums.
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Nielsen Ratings Data: ©2011 The Nielsen Company. All Rights Reserved. All ratings above Live+SD (live viewing plus same day DVR viewing)
