-- Ratings are in for Wednesday's installment of the Wednesday Night Wars -- with AEW Dynamite taking the night with an average viewership of 817,000 to NXT's 757,000.
However, the Dynamite number was down 12 percent from last week while NXT dipped by just two percent.
In the 18-49 demo, AEW averaged a 0.3 rating, down 17 percent from last week, good for a 10th place finish on cable. NXT was up nine percent in the demo, averaging a 0.24, putting them 21st.
The NXT demo number represents one of their best showings since their first few weeks, and the gap of 0.6 between the two was the closest the WWE property has been since December 18 when they beat Dynamite.
In addition to people over 50, NXT also had a slight win in females 18-49 with a 0.18 to 0.16 advantage over AEW. Per usual, AEW's strongest category was men 18-49, where they had a 0.41 to 0.28 advantage.
In most other categories, the shows were either tied or within 0.03 of each other.
Miz and Mrs, which immediately followed NXT on USA, was down four percent this week, averaging 457,000 viewers. That was good for 49th on cable in the 18-49 demo with a 0.16 rating.
Here's a look at the last 10 weeks of competition as well as the average in ratings and total viewership for both shows:
-- Raw increased eight percent from last week's low level with a show that did the best job of keeping the audience in a long time.
Raw averaged 2.34 million viewers, not far off the 2.40 million for the show the day after the Royal Rumble. But more important was the ratings pattern where for the first time since August 26, the audience grew in the second hour. This isn't unusual during daylight savings time but it is very unusual during standard time, particularly in the winter.
The first hour was up three percent from last week, but the second hour was up 11 percent and third hour was up nine percent.
The first-to-third hour drops were minor -- four percent for women 18-49, five percent for men 18-49, teenage girls increased 14 percent, teenage boys dropped 11 percent, and over 50 dropped six percent.
Raw was first in 18-49 and eighth overall on cable, trailing only news shows on Fox News and MSNBC.
The show was down five percent from the same week last year.
The real story was the growth of teenagers and over 50 in hour number two, which also was stable in 18-49.
In particular, the big winner was Angel Garza, whose match with Cedric Alexander was the high point of the show.
The three hours were:
8 p.m. 2.40 million viewers
9 p.m. 2.41 million viewers
10 p.m. 2.20 million viewers
-- We were able to see a quarter-hour breakdown of last Friday’s edition of Friday Night SmackDown that featured Bill Goldberg’s appearance to challenge The Fiend for a Universal title match.
The show peaked in the first segment with the return of ‘The Dirt Sheet’ with The Miz and John Morrison, who was confronted by the New Day with an average of 2,657,000 viewers.
From 8:15-8:30 pm, it was The Usos vs. The Miz & John Morrison and it fell 150,000 viewers to an average of 2,507,000 viewers.
The next quarter dropped 29,000 viewers with Alexa Bliss and Nikki Cross backstage, a backstage segment with King Corbin, and Elias performing in the ring before the interruption by Sami Zayn and Cesaro.
The 8:45-9:00 pm quarter increased by 31,000 viewers for Elias vs. Cesaro and King Corbin coming out.
9 – 9:15 pm increased by 125,000 viewers to 2,634,000 viewers for Roman Reigns attacking King Corbin followed by Bill Goldberg’s satellite interview and Firefly Fun House segment and the locker room segment with Daniel Bryan and Heath Slater.
The next quarter fell by 52,000 viewers for Bryan vs. Slater, the Braun Strowman interview with Renee Young followed by Zayn and Shinsuke Nakamura attacking Strowman and The Revival joining in.
9:30-9:45 pm dropped another 160,000 viewers for the Otis video with Tucker, Sheamus vs. Apollo Crews, and the start of the women’s four-way main event. This was the lowest quarter of the show with an average of 2,422,000 viewers.
The final quarter increased by 89,000 viewers for the conclusion of the women’s four-way match with Carmella over Alexa Bliss, Dana Brooke, and Naomi.
-- This week's episode of WWE Backstage drew the show's second-best viewership since it premiered in its regular time slot.
Backstage averaged 169,000 viewers on FS1 last night, which was up 74 percent from the 97,000 viewers it did last week. The rating in the 18-49 demo was a 0.06, up from last week's 0.05.
This week's Backstage began at 11:15 p.m. Eastern time and had a strong lead-in. The second and final day of this year's Westminster Dog Show averaged 1.089 million viewers on FS1 and did a 0.17 rating in 18-49.
The Dog Show began at 7:30 p.m. Eastern time and ended when Backstage began.
CM Punk returned to the Backstage panel last night, making his fourth appearance as an analyst. The best viewership the show has averaged in its normal time slot remains the 180,000 viewers it did on November 19, where Punk officially debuted on Backstage after making a surprise appearance the previous week.
Charlotte Flair was the in-studio guest on Backstage last night.
Here's a look at Backstage's viewership since its official premiere:
November 5 -- 49,000 viewers
November 12 -- 100,000 viewers
November 19 -- 180,000 viewers
November 26 -- 121,000 viewers
December 3 --138,000 viewers
December 10 -- 127,000 viewers
December 17 -- 95,000 viewers
December 24 -- 153,000 viewers
December 31 -- 97,000 viewers
January 7 -- 124,000 viewers
January 14 -- 84,000 viewers
January 21 -- 111,000 viewers
January 28 -- 97,000 viewers
February 4 -- 97,000 viewers
February 11 -- 169,000 viewers
