It looks like the Cougars could be quite the money-maker for the Big 12 after all.
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A fantastic Week 1 of college football is over, and we figured out at least one thing: the Houston Cougars are the real deal on the football field, as they took down No. 3 Oklahoma 33-23 on Saturday. Tom Herman and his team looked great, and they could be a real College Football Playoff contender.
The other thing we found out? The Cougars are a ratings draw as well, as the Houston-Oklahoma game drew a bigger rating in Houston than Sunday's Texas-Notre Dame did.
Okla-Hou: 4.0 overnight & 12.8 in Houston, market’s highest rating for an opening weekend cfb game across ESPN nets pic.twitter.com/3Eyc4pjM63
— ESPN PR (@ESPNPR) September 4, 2016
Nielsen locals for ND-Texas on ABC: Austin 25.4, SA 15.1, DFW 13.1, Houston 11.5.
— David Barron (@dfbarron) September 5, 2016
The Texas-Notre Dame game did draw more overall viewers nationally, but there is a key point here about Houston's drawing power. A lot of people have questioned if the addition of another Texas team would prove fruitful for the Big 12, but if Houston can really draw heavily in their local market — which is one of the Top 5 in the United States — then it will definitely be a worthy endeavor.
RELATED: Here's the play that helped Houston upset No. 3 Oklahoma
Can a contending Houston team do that continuously against AAC opponents? Probably not. But if they can do it against Big 12 opponents consistently, then that would prove to be a huge win for a conference that has had to worry about the SEC encroaching on their media territory over the past several years.
