Super Bowl Plays Games With Sweep-week Syndies

Super Bowl fever took its toll on the weekly syndication rankings, which included the first weekend of the February sweep. Only one of the top 10 weekly hours managed any increase in rating for the weekend.

The top-rated weekly hour was "Entertainment Tonight Weekend" (4.0), up 8% during Super Bowl weekend. The second-highest weekly show for the week ending Feb. 3 was "Stargate SG-1" (2.8), down 3%, according to Nielsen Media Research.

The rookie off-network weekly "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" was third with a 2.7 rating, flat week-to-week.

Also coming in at a 2.7 was the veteran off-network drama "ER," down 4% at sweep opening. In fifth place, "Gene Roddenberry's Andromeda" (2.6) was down 7%.

The show tied with newcomer "The Practice" (2.6), which was down 10% for the week. "Mutant X" (2.4) was down 4%, "The X-Files" (2.3) was down 21%, "World's Wildest Police Videos" (2.2) was down 15%, and "VIP" (2.1) was flat.

The frame also included the first two weekdays of the sweep period, but some strips were pre-empted by the State of the Union address Jan. 29, which may have skewed numbers for the entire week.

"Texas Justice," in its fourth week of national syndication, remained the top-rated rookie for the season despite a 9% slide to a 2.1 rating.

"Crossing Over With John Edward" remained in second place with a 2.0 rating, unchanged week-to-week. "Weakest Link," a new syndicated version of the network hit, was up 6% to a 1.8, putting it in third place among first-season syndicated strips.