Cinderellas reign in Final Four ratings

Lesser-known schools boost viewership by 35 percent

2013-07-25

(Press-News.org) Most pro basketball fans would assume that TV executives want to see teams from the largest markets go the furthest in the playoffs. But in college basketball, however, the most fans tune in for teams they probably hadn't heard of a month ago.

BYU statistics professor Scott Grimshaw's research found that a NCAA Men's Final Four game featuring a Cinderella team, or an underdog from a smaller school, will have a 35 percent larger TV audience than a game featuring two national powerhouse schools. That 35 percent jump translates to 3 million more viewers for a semifinal game and 4.5 million more for the championship game.

"The Cinderella teams, with all the national media attention they get, become a national star," Grimshaw said. "It's not that these schools have an established national fan base, it's that the NCAA tournament celebrates the Cinderella more so than other sports."

Grimshaw built a statistical model to gauge how valuable each team was in terms of its TV popularity. The study, published in the Journal of Quantitative Analysis in Sports, used Nielsen TV ratings to examine the 30 Final Four games that occurred from 2003-2012.

The jump in ratings is even bigger when two Cinderella teams face off in the Final Four. Nearly 11 million households tuned in when Virginia Commonwealth met Butler in a 2011 semifinal game. Without their respective Cinderella labels, the model predicted an audience of only 6.4 million.

Although a championship game featuring two Cinderella teams hasn't happened yet, Grimshaw's model extrapolates that it would result in an 81 percent larger audience.

"Our research can't answer definitively why Cinderella's are more popular for fans, though it does prove they are," said co-author Paul Sabin, a student in the integrated BS/MS statistics program. "By the time the tournament reaches the Final Four, most fans' local teams have been eliminated. It's plausible that interest for casual fans decreases as a result, but that Cinderella's provide them the motivation to tune in and root for the little guy."

The data included 24 teams and the viewership from 56 major television markets. Although powerhouse schools like UCLA, Florida and Syracuse might hail from the largest TV markets, audiences tune in more to root for Butler, VCU, George Mason and other Cinderella teams that have won their way into the Final Four over the past decade.

Previous research using National Football League and European Premier League soccer data found three main reasons fans tune in: big-market teams, big-name stars and closely contested matches. Only the last of those three factors held up when it comes to the NCAA Tournament.

"Our paper was myth-busting to a certain degree because two of those three assumptions are wrong in college basketball," said Grimshaw. "The top 10 teams in terms of national importance had no national effect on TV ratings, though they all had a strong local following."

The statistical model built by Grimshaw, Sabin and BYU Broadcasting Director of Marketing Keith Willes allows for audience size prediction in different TV markets. This information could allow CBS to strategically target their advertising regionally.

"CBS didn't pay $10.8 billion to acquire the rights to the NCAA basketball tournament because they love sports, they did it to make money," said Grimshaw.

### END

ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

Extinct ancient ape did not walk like a human, study shows

2013-07-25

AUSTIN, Texas — For decades, the movement of an ancient ape species called Oreopithecus bambolii has been a matter of debate for scientists. Did it walk like a human across its swampy Mediterranean island or did it move through the trees like other apes? According to a new study, led by University of Texas at Austin anthropologists Gabrielle A. Russo and Liza Shapiro, the 9- to 7-million-year-old ape from Italy did not, in fact, walk habitually on two legs. The findings refute a long body of evidence, suggesting that Oreopithecus had the capabilities for bipedal (moving ...

Researchers find potential new target to treat malignant pleural mesothelioma

2013-07-25

DENVER – Malignant mesothelioma is a rare asbestos-associated malignancy with limited therapeutic options. Despite advances in the treatment, the median survival remains 12 months from the time of diagnosis. Increased understanding of the molecular basis for the diverse signaling pathways involved in cancer progression should promote the discovery of novel biomarkers for early diagnosis and potentially lead to more effective therapeutic tools for the disease. In the September issue of the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer's journal, the Journal of ...

Need for national Canadian strategy for EGFR testing

2013-07-25

DENVER – Significant advances have taken place in the management of patients with advanced and metastatic non–small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) over the last 5 years. Traditionally, all advanced NSCLC patients were treated in a similar manner. More recently, the importance of pathologic subtype has been recognized. Data from several randomized trials demonstrate that epidermal growth factor (EGFR) mutation status is predictive of improved survival and quality of life with selected systemic therapies. Researchers in Canada examined the barriers to the initial implementation ...

Effect of obesity on patients with advanced non-small cell lung cancer

2013-07-25

DENVER – Obesity increases health risks for many things. Researchers wanted to know the impact of obesity on outcomes of patients with advanced non-small cell lung cancer. In the September issue of the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer's journal, the Journal of Thoracic Oncology (JTO), researchers conclude that obese patients had superior outcomes early on in the study, but then experienced increased hazards. During the period from 1993 to 2004, the Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group enrolled 2684 patients to three phase III trials of first-line ...

Ecology in agricultural landscapes: Seeking solutions for food, water, wildlife

2013-07-25

Agriculture alters the landscape more than any other human activity, with trickle-down effects on water, soil, climate, plant and wildlife diversity, wildfire, and human health. Crop and rangeland occupies nearly 40 percent of earth's ice-free land, and mountains and deserts make much of the remaining surface unwelcoming to agriculture. Our increasing population applies constant pressure for further conversion of wild lands to agricultural production. With yields plateauing in many parts of the world, managers, both private and public, are looking for new ideas to get the ...

Stopping cholesterol drugs may be associated with increased risk of Parkinson's

2013-07-25

MINNEAPOLIS – People who stop taking cholesterol drugs may be at an increased risk for developing Parkinson's disease, according to research that appears in the July 24, 2013, online issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology. Previous studies on the relationship between cholesterol drugs called statins and the risk of Parkinson's disease have had inconsistent results. The current study involved 43,810 people in Taiwan who were taking statins and did not have Parkinson's disease. Taiwan's compulsory national health insurance program ...

Rules of attraction: Catching a peahen's eye

2013-07-25

Getting the undivided attention of a female is tough at the best of times but it's even harder when surrounded by other male suitors. It's no wonder males often resort to ostentatious displays to distinguish themselves from the crowd, and nowhere is this clearer than in peacocks. Sexual selection has driven the evolution of their showy iridescent trains, whose main purpose is to attract females. But what is it about this train of colourful feathers that attracts peahens? Is it the characteristic eyespots or perhaps the green scale-like feathers? Researchers have tried to ...

Brain research shows psychopathic criminals do not lack empathy, but fail to use it automatically

2013-07-25

Criminal psychopathy can be both repulsive and fascinating, as illustrated by the vast number of books and movies inspired by this topic. Offenders diagnosed with psychopathy pose a significant threat to society, because they are more likely to harm other individuals and to do so again after being released. A brain imaging study in the Netherlands shows individuals with psychopathy have reduced empathy while witnessing the pains of others. When asked to empathize, however, they can activate their empathy. This could explain why psychopathic individuals can be callous and ...

'Weightism' increases risk for becoming, staying obese

2013-07-25

Weight discrimination may increase risk for obesity rather than motivating individuals to lose weight, according to research published July 24 in the open access journal PLOS ONE by Angelina Sutin and Antonio Terracciano from the Florida State University College of Medicine. The researchers compared the height and weight of over 6000 participants, measured in 2006 and 2010. They found that participants who experienced weight discrimination earlier were 2.5 times more likely to become obese by the follow-up assessment in 2010. Obese participants who perceived weight discrimination ...

Laser-controlled molecular switch turns blood clotting on, off on command

2013-07-25

Researchers have designed tiny, light-controlled gold particles that can release DNA controls to switch blood clotting off and on. The results are reported July 24 in the open access journal PLOS ONE by Kimberly Hamad-Schifferli and colleagues from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The two-way switch for blood clotting relies on the ability of two gold nanoparticles to selectively release different DNA molecules from their surface under different wavelengths of laser excitation. When stimulated by one wavelength, one nanorod releases a piece of DNA that binds ...

Novel radiation therapy QA method: Monte Carlo simulation meets deep learning for fast, accurate epid transmission dose generation

A 100-fold leap into the unknown: a new search for muonium conversion into antimuonium

A new approach to chiral α-amino acid synthesis - photo-driven nitrogen heterocyclic carbene catalyzed highly enantioselective radical α-amino esterification

Physics-defying discovery sheds new light on how cells move

Institute for Data Science in Oncology announces new focus-area lead for advancing data science to reduce public cancer burden

Korea University College of Medicine successfully concludes the 2025 Lee Jong-Wook Fellowship on Infectious Disease Specialists Program

Girls are happiest at school – for good reasons

Researchers from the University of Maryland School of Medicine discover genetic ancestry is a critical component of assessing head and neck cancerous tumors

Can desert sand be used to build houses and roads?

New species of ladybird beetle discovered on Kyushu University campus

[Press-News.org] Cinderellas reign in Final Four ratings
Lesser-known schools boost viewership by 35 percent

Cinderellas reign in Final Four ratings

ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES: