You Can Sleep Now

Do you ever stay up at night wondering how popular Notre Dame football is?

Of course you don’t, unless you have the same issues that cause grown men to dress up as, say, pillaging raiders.

Anyway, for those who do wonder, the Irish remain very, very popular and as proof we offer the ratings for their season-opening victory over Georgia Tech on Sept. 2. That game earned a 5.4 rating and an 11 share, which likely makes an astute observer say, what the heck does that mean? In truth, we don’t know, but we do know that the game was the most watched sporting event of the entire week.

It beat out NBC’s NASCAR race (5.0 rating, 10 share) and everything else. In fact, just over six million households watched the game on ABC. That’s a 77.2 percent increase compared to the same time slot the previous year, when Notre Dame-Pittsburgh and Clemson-Texas A&M split the national slot.

What does this mean in the big picture? Well, for one thing, you can sleep now. For another, you can check out my column today.