Clay Travis Takes To X To Highlight The Continued Viewership Struggles For The NBA As League Loses In The Ratings To Women's College Basketball

Thursday night TV viewers had a choice between watching the Boston Celtics take on the Miami Heat or watching the South Carolina Gamecocks take on the LSU Tigers in some women's hoops action. Believe it or not, more people went with the South Carolina-LSU game, and as OutKick founder Clay Travis pointed out, it's yet another sign that the NBA is seriously on the skids.

According to Sports Media Watch, the Celtics and Heat drew 1.387 million viewers on TNT.

Meanwhile, South Carolina and LSU drew 1.555 million on ESPN, with both games starting within about 15 minutes of each other, putting them more or less in direct competition.

Tough to argue with the numbers: that women's basketball game drew around 200,000 more viewers than the NBA did.

That's a tough look for the NBA — albeit an incredible one for women's college basketball — and it's hard not to think it's completely of their own doing.

The NBA Started This With Its Descent Into Wokeness

No major league has gone headfirst into wokeness the way the NBA has. From goofy slogans on jerseys instead of names on the backs of jerseys to LeBron holding court to Gregg Popovich yelling at clouds, the league has become a cheap buffet of wokeness.

As we all know, the overwhelming majority of fans want nothing to do with that. They want to watch sports, and the involvement of South Carolina head coach Dawn Staley notwithstanding, there was less of that to be found in that evening's college hoops game.

Clay is right, the NBA has a serious problem on its hands, especially when its trying to cut some new TV deals.

What network is going to see numbers like that and still hand the league the bag of cash it thinks it deserves?

None.

If there is one saving grace — and it's a small one — the NBA drew a bigger share of adults ages 18-49. That's a significant marketing demographic and the Celtics-Heat game pulled a .48 share to South Carolina-LSU's .32 share.

Follow on X: @Matt_Reigle