FOXBOROUGH, Mass. - The New England Patriots opened their 2019 campaign in championship fashion, unveiling their sixth Super Bowl banner and defeating the Pittsburgh Steelers, 33-3, at Gillette Stadium in a primetime matchup on NBC's Sunday Night Football.
With the victory, which extended the Patriots' undefeated streak at home to 14 regular season games, the team also extended their winning streak in television ratings, both in the local and national markets.
Locally, the game delivered a 35.1 household rating and 58 share in the Boston market, which is the highest season-opener rating for the Patriots since 2016. The game averaged 1,298,600 viewers in Boston and peaked with over 1.5 million local viewers and a 39.7 rating at 9:15 p.m. With these numbers, the Patriots once again claimed the week's top spot in local ratings across all programming in Boston.
The Patriots-Steelers game proved a must-see matchup for national audiences, as well. The NBC broadcast generated an overnight household rating of 14.8 and share of 26 (not including digital), which marks a 3 percent increase over last year's Sunday Night Football opener between the Bears and Packers. The game also averaged 22.7 million viewers across platforms, making it NBC Sports Digital's most streamed Sunday regular season game ever.
The Patriots will look to improve to 2-0 this week when they travel to Miami for a 1 p.m. matchup with the Dolphins on Sunday, Sept. 15, at Hard Rock Stadium. CBS's Ian Eagle and Dan Fouts will call the game from the booth, with Evan Washburn providing updates from the sideline. The broadcast can be seen locally on WBZ.
