In a battle of the young guns and the two surprise teams in the NBA Playoffs game six of the Oklahoma City and Memphis series will be seen live at 9p.m on ESPN with the Thunder up 3-2. Tonight’s game will be played in Memphis where the city has been dealing with devastating floods as the Mississippi River has overflowed its banks.
The Grizzlies hope to reward their fans with a win to extend the series to a seventh game Sunday on ABC at 3:30pm.
However if the Thunder does win then that Sunday 3:30p.m. window will be for game one of the Western Conference Finals against Dallas.
All of the Western Conference Finals games will be seen on ESPN/ABC. Of course the NBA Finals will be seen on ABC.
Meanwhile Sunday night in primetime on TNT it will be Miami at Chicago in what is going to be a real ratings grabbing Eastern Conference Final. The folks at Turner Sports must be very happy to be airing all the Eastern Conference Finals games.
TNT’s will use 26 total cameras for each game including robo cams in locker rooms, a sky cam and aerial coverage for every game. They get inside the game by having each head coach mic’d up for all the games. There will be live video chats on NBA.com with a cool chance for viewers to have their questions answered by NBA analysts.
The chats will feature Kenny Smith (Game 2), Charles Barkley (Game 3) and Steve Kerr (Game 5, if necessary). Charles Barkley’s chat will also be available on charlesbarkley.com.
TNT’s studio team of Ernie Johnson (host) alongside Barkley and Smith (analysts) will be live on site for every game of the Miami – Chicago series. They will provide their pregame, halftime and postgame analysis.
Meanwhile the broadcast crew will have play-by-play announcer Marv Albert, analysts Kerr and Reggie Miller and sideline reporter Craig Sager covering the action. The studio crew will be joined by NBA TV and TNT analysts Kevin McHale and Chris Webber for select games. TNT’s Cheryl Miller will also provide reports from the Western Conference Finals.
NBA TV will offer a 30 minute pregame show before all of the TNT games and the program will feature hosts Matt Winer, Rick Kamla and Marc Fein will be joined by analysts Greg Anthony, Brent Barry, Dennis Scott and Steve Smith, broadcasting from the network’s Atlanta studio.
Look for all the post game press conferences and analysis also on NBA TV.
Here from TNT is a look inside the ratings:
TNT’s coverage of the 2011 NBA Playoffs continues to establish record-setting numbers for the network as the most-watched and highest-rated basketball postseason to-date in cable television history and has helped establish TNT as one of the top networks in all of television during its telecast windows among male viewership. Through the first two rounds of the NBA Playoffs (35 total games), the network is averaging a 3.0 U.S. HH Rating, (+25%, 2.4 U.S. HH Rating last year), 4,823,000 Total Viewers (+33%, 3,638,000 last year) and 3,534,000 Households (+29%, 2,735,000 last year). Last year TNT aired 33 games through the first two rounds of the NBA Playoffs. TNT’s second round coverage during Primetime (10 games) also out-delivered all of television, both broadcast and cable, in primetime averages onsix nights with M18-34 and five nights with M18-49.
Overall, TNT’s 2011 NBA Playoffs coverage has also delivered strong double-digit growth across all key demos, including:
- A18-34 +41% (1,598,000 vs. 1,130,000)
- A18-49 +38% (2,776,000 vs. 2,011,000)
- A25-54 +33% (2,484,000 vs. 1,866,000)
- M18-34 +40% (1,118000 vs. 800,000)
- M18-49 +39% (1,974,000 vs. 1,417,000)
- M25-54 +34% (1,747,000 vs. 1,299,000)
