Friday Ratings: CBS ‘Hawaii Five-O’ And ‘Blue Bloods’ Top The Night, But NBC’s ‘The Blacklist’ Strong

CBS was strong in the Friday night ratings demographics race, thanks to the big performances of Hawaii Five-0 and Blue Bloods, which tied for the night’s best score with identical 0.7/4s.

The eye network began the night with MacGyver hitting an 0.6/4 and 5.62 million audience, ticking upward afterward with Hawaii Five-0 (0.7/4 and 6.55 million) and Blue Bloods (0.7/4 and 7.71 million).

But NBC’s The Blacklist held onto a strong audience score as well, hitting an 0.6/4 for its first hour and 0.5/3 and 3.97 million for its second, thanks to a big secret revealed on the show about Raymond “Red” Reddington (James Spader). The network’s overall night was capped by a strong surge from Dateline, which came in at 0.6/4 and 4.02 million with no newsmag competition thanks to NFL draft coverage on ABC taking the slot usually occupied by 20/20.

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Overall, CBS and NBC tied for the network demo race, each with an 0.6/3.  CBS had the larger audience average, 6.63 million to 4.04 million.

ABC’s broadcast coverage of the NFL Draft Day 2 scored an 0.5/3 and 2.58 million audience, but was no doubt cannibalized in part by coverage from ESPN and the NFL Network and a start before prime time in the Pacific time zone.

Fox had a quiet night. A rerun of Last Man Standing scored an 0.5/3 and 2.88 million, dragging down the scores of The Cool Kids (0.4/2 and 2.16 million) and Proven Innocent (0.3/2 and 1.75 million).

At The CW, Dynasty had an 0.2/1 and 0.59 million, with Whose Line Is It Anyway? at 0.1/1 and 0.54 million.