Ten Most-Watched College Football Games of 2018

Here’s a look at the 10 games that drew the most fans to their TV sets during the 2018 college football season. As you might expect, the SEC and Big 10 dominated the action.

Ten Most-Watched Games of 2018 season

Game # of Viewers Conference Time Network

Alabama vs. Georgia 17.5 million SEC-Champ 3:00 pm CBS

Michigan @ Ohio St. 13.2 million Big 10 11:00 am Fox

Alabama @ LSU 11.5 million SEC 7:00 pm CBS

Texas vs. Oklahoma 10.2 million Big 12-Champ 11:00 am ABC

Ohio St. @ Penn St. 9.1 million Big 10 6:30 pm ABC

Auburn @ Alabama 9.1 million SEC 2:30 pm CBS

Army vs. Navy 9.1 million IND 3:00 pm CBS

Ohio St. vs. Northwestern 8.7 million Big 10-Champ 7:00 pm Fox

Notre Dame @ USC 7.7 million IND - Pac12 7:00 pm ABC

Ohio St. vs. TCU 7.2 million Big 10 – Big 12 7:00 pm ABC

A quick look shows that three of the ten games are conference championships. The Big 12 match between Texas and OU is far and away the largest seen for the league since the 2009 Texas-Nebraska game.

Seven of the games highlight intra-conference matches. Three are from the SEC (All with Alabama as one of the teams) and three are from the Big 10 with Ohio State appearing in all three (Michigan @ Notre Dame is #11 with 7.1 million viewers).

Texas-OU is the only Big 12 contest to appear on the list. Army-Navy continues to be an outstanding draw, thanks in part to its pageantry and history, as well as to being the only college football game on the schedule.

Over the next week we will take a look at the top games for each of the Power 5 leagues, minus non-conference action.