WWE NXT Ratings Up Significantly From Last Week Despite NBA And NHL Playoff Competition

WWE NXT on the USA Network this past Tuesday night saw a significant jump in the ratings from last week despite strong competition from the NBA and NHL playoffs.

NXT averaged 601,000 viewers this past Tuesday night, per Showbuzz Daily. The audience was up 13% from last week, however last week's episode drew the lowest audience in the history of the show on the USA Network. This week's episode garnered the second-best audience since the NBA playoffs started in April.

NXT ranked #30 on cable in the 18-49 demographic with a 0.14 rating. The rating was up a whopping 40% from last week's record-low 0.10 rating for a show on USA. It was tied with the April 26th episode as the best rating in the demo since the NBA playoffs kicked off.

The show held up well year-to-year. NXT was down 14% in total viewers, while the 18-49 demo rating was down only 7% despite this year's facing much tougher sports competition. Last year's episode was against back-to-back NBA playoff games that averaged 1.385 million viewers and 2.5 million viewers, respectively, while this year the majority of the show was against the NBA conference finals which averaged 6.07 million viewers. Similarly, the audience for the NHL playoff game opposing Tuesday's show was up 84% from the NHL playoff game against NXT the same week last year.

Tuesday's episode of WWE NXT featured Tony D'Angelo battling Santos Escobar, while Roxanne Perez defeated Kiana James in the NXT Women's Breakout Tournament. Full WWE NXT results are here.