The Week 9 HBCU football games broadcasted on ESPNU were the least watched college football contests of the week, per SportsMediaWatch. The Thursday Night primetime game between North Carolina Central and South Carolina State drew 25,000 viewers and Florida A&M's homecoming game against Prairie View A&M drew 28,000 viewers.

The low number of viewers for the past few telecasts of HBCU Football on ESPNU is concerning, especially when HBCU football has attracted viewers en masse on other channels. Last week's HBCU football broadcasts also saw the same low viewership total. The October 19th evening broadcast of North Carolina Central vs. Morgan State drew 27,000 linear television viewers and the October 21st afternoon broadcast of Howard's homecoming game vs. Hampton drew 25,000 viewers.

The root cause of the linear viewership decrease appears to be due to the availability of ESPNU as well as the timeslots selected for the games. The Thursday night HBCU broadcasts typically compete against Thursday Night Football on Amazon Prime for the attention of HBCU fans. The NBA season also tipped off on last week and last Thursday's matchup on TNT featured Damian Lillard in his season debut with the Bucks vs. the James Harden-less 76ers before his trade to the Clippers.

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While the HBCU football games were dealt with stiff broadcast competition, the accessibility of ESPNU is also a major factor. Per a report by John Ourand of the Sports Business Journal, ESPNU is only available in 37 million homes. The games are also available on the ESPN app but ESPN doesn't normally release their digital numbers for regular season contests publicly.

This week's ESPNU Thursday Night Primetime game is Bethune-Cookman vs. Mississippi Valley State. The game is slated to air at 7:30 PM EST.