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What's the story?
The contest between the Oklahoma City Thunder and the Houston Rockets drew the best prime time Christmas rating in 14 years.
In case you didn't know...
The combined coverage of all the four games averaged a 3.9 rating which is an improvement of almost 39 percent from last season's Christmas day schedule.
The heart of the matter...
The fans couldn’t wait to sit down after post-Christmas dinner to watch Brodie take on the Beard as the Thunder hosted the Rockets on Monday. This contest recorded a 4.1 metered market rating making it the highest-rated prime-time Christmas Day game since 2003. That game also involved the Houston Rockets as they went on to defeat the Los Angeles Lakers 99-87 on Dec 25, 2003.
The Thunder-Rockets match was not Monday’s highest-rated tilt, however. It belonged to none other than the Finals rematch between the Warriors and the Cavaliers which ended with another controversial decision late into the fourth quarter, but the Dubs being on the beneficial end of the ruling this time. The match ended 99-92 in the favor of the Warriors and delivered a 5.5 metered market rating.
What's next?
The Oklahoma City Thunder have now won 11 of their last 14 games after defeating the Rockets and would like to continue their streak as they face the 2nd seeded Toronto Raptors on Wednesday.
After this defeat, Rockets have now lost three in a row and have lost the top spot in the Western Conference. They would hope to get back Paul, who is suffering from a strained groin muscle and would like to get back to winning ways as they play the top-seeded Boston Celtics on Thursday.
Author's take
These two teams are amongst the top contenders to go against the Warriors in a possible Western Conference Finals, but they just might have to go through each other to reach that stage and therefore we can expect this Christmas match to be a trailer for the movie about to come in April/May next year.
