ABC Wins Thursday in Adults 18-34

Some early info on ABC's Thursday, ahead of the regular press release.

With its new summer Thursday lineup, ABC won the evening among Adults 18-34, beating CBS with its season premiere of Big Brother, Fox with So You Think You Can Dance and NBC with an original Love Bites. The Net also ranked #1 on the night with key Men (M18-34/M18-49) and was the top-rated broadcaster with Teens 12-17 and Kids 2-11.

· ABC grew over the same night last year by 8% in Adults 18-34, while retaining 100% of its Adult 18-49 audience.

At 8pm, ABC's Wipeout won its time period for the 3rd straight week in both Total Viewers and Adults 18-49, beating its unscripted competition on Fox (So You Think You Can Dance) by 1.2 million viewers and by 25% in young adults.

· The ABC unscripted series increased its overall audience week to week, while hitting its top Men 18-34 number in the hour in more than 4 months - since 2/24/11.

During the 9 o'clock hour opposite the season premiere of CBS' veteran Big Brother, ABC's freshman Expedition Impossible earned second place in viewers and young adults, while registering as the #1 broadcast show with Teens and Kids. Against the CBS reality premiere, the broad-appealing ABC unscripted series built over the prior week with Men 18-34 (+9%) and Kids 2-11 (+8%).

· Despite facing greater competition in the hour year to year with the season opener of Big Brother shifting from 8pm to 9pm, Expedition Impossible boosted its time period for ABC by 7% in Adults 18-49 and by 8% in Adults 18-34 from the same night last year with original programming.

ABC's Rookie Blue took first place in Thursday's 10 o'clock hour in Adults 18-49 for the 3rd week running, more than doubling NBC's original Love Bites (+114%) in key young adult sales demographic. The ABC sophomore drama also finished #1 in the hour with Adults 25-54.

· Rookie Blue was up week to week in both viewers (+6%) and young adults (+7%).

· Rookie Blue substantially improved its time period over the year-ago night with original programming by 16% in Total Viewers and by 36% in Adults 18-49.