The 50th Annual Bayou Classic was broadcast on NBC for the second year in a row after a stint on the now-defunct NBC Sports Network and it got significant viewership on one of the biggest weekends in college football. The Bayou Classic drew 685,0000 viewers on NBC, per a ratings report by SportsMediaWatch. The Bayou Classic broadcast went head-to-head with the second half of a tightly contested Ohio-Michigan game (19,065,000 viewers) and fared well depending on the circumstances.

The viewership number is down from the 2022 airing of the game, although very slightly. The 49th Annual Bayou Classic was the first edition of the game that was broadcast on NBC since they moved the game off the broadcast channel in 2014. Last year's edition of the game drew 722K viewers, which was a 386% jump from the 2021 broadcast on NBC Sports Network.

The number is significant as it shows how making HBCU football more accessible can do wonders for ratings and viewership numbers. For years, the Bayou Classic was the only HBCU game that was shown on broadcast TV, meaning that you didn't have to get a traditional cable package to view the game.

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Other HBCU games during the regular season and even postseason games such as the SWAC Championship and the now-defunct Heritage Bowl were broadcast on cable channels such as the Bob Johnson-owned BET, ESPN, Aspire TV, Bounce TV, or other defunct cable operators such as MBC Network. Some games were not broadcast at all.

This year, we had the MEAC-SWAC Challenge broadcast on ABC (922,000 viewers) and we will look forward to the Celebration Bowl also on ABC featuring Howard University and possibly Florida A&M or Prairie View A&M. That will be three HBCU football games that will have been broadcast on basic cable, up two from the pre-Celebration Bowl era of 2015.

HBCU football will be back on TV for the SWAC Championship, as it will be broadcast on ESPN2 on Saturday at 4 PM EST.