Wednesday, February 6, 2013

Super Bowl XLVII By The Numbers



BY SCOTT MORGANROTH

When my girlfriend Candy told me that “this is one Super Bowl which has the least objections to either team winning,” the numbers backed her up.

The Baltimore Ravens 34-31 victory over the San Francisco 49‘ers has set a record for highest overnight ratings in Super Bowl history, the Nielsen Company reported Monday.

Nielsen reported the game scored a 48.1 rating a 71 share in its select measurement of big cities. That’s 1 percent over a similar measurement in last years game.

For three years in a row, the Super Bowl has set a new record for most-watched event in U.S. television history.

One ratings point represents 1,147,000 households or 1 percent of the nations estimated 114.7 million TV homes. The share means that 71 percent of TV’s that were on at the time were tuned to the Super Bowl.

Prior to the game, only one CBS analyst correctly predicted the outcome.

Former Pittsburgh Steelers Coach Bill Cowher predicted Baltimore would win 28-26.

For those individuals on the NFL Competition Committee that want to eliminate kick-offs due to safety reasons, remember the 108-yard kick-off return by Jacoby Jones which he ran back for a touchdown to open the second half. This gave the Ravens a 28-6 lead.

San Francisco sports franchises have seen bizarre events in championship rounds.

This Super Bowl saw a 34-minute Power Outage that nearly worked well for the young 49‘ers. San Francisco outscored Baltimore 25-6.

In 1989, an Earthquake disrupted the World Series for 10 days as the San Francisco Giants were swept 4-0 by their Bay Area rivals the Oakland A’s.

Here are some other interesting facts worth mentioning about Super Bowl XLVII:

*Baltimore QB Joe Flacco completed a remarkable playoff tournament. He threw for 11 touchdowns to tie a post-season record, had no interceptions in 126 playoff passes.

*Only one other championship game in the NFL’s 80-year title game history, Pittsburgh’s 35-31 win over Dallas in 1979, featured both teams scoring at least 30 points.

*San Francisco out gained Baltimore in the following categories, total yards 484-380, passing 302-287 and rushing 182-93. 49‘ers running back and former Miami Hurricane Frank Gore amassed 110 yards and had a touchdown. He out rushed the Ravens by himself. San Francisco had two wide receivers over 100 yards. Michael Crabtree amassed 109 yards and had a touchdown. Vernon Davis added 104 yards in the losing effort. 

The 49‘ers are now 5-1 in Super Bowls all-time. Baltimore is 2-0.

*Baltimore wide receiver Anquan Boldin was denied a Super Bowl Ring in 2008 when his Arizona Cardinals lost the Super Bowl in Tampa to the Pittsburgh Steelers. But now he has his jewelry by gaining 104 yards and a touchdown Sunday.

*This was the longest Super Bowl ever at 4 hours and 14 minutes.

The Ravens stumbled into the playoffs with four defeats in their last five regular-season games as Ray Lewis recovered from a torn right triceps.

How important are regular season records? The last three Super Bowl Winners Green Bay (10-6), New York Giants (9-7) and Baltimore (10-6) knew all they had to do was reach the tournament. 

Scott Morganroth can be reached at scottsports33@aol.com. 

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