Live + 7 Day Ratings: ABC's "Scandal" Solidifies Its Victory over NBC's "Blacklist" / ABC's "Fresh Off the Boat" Emerges as TV's #3 Sitcom

Live + 7 Day ratings for the week of 2/2/15 (Week #20):

Please note: ABC's regular Sunday line-up is on hiatus until Sunday, March 1. Both The Goldbergs and black-ish were pre-empted for Fresh Off the Boat.

ABC had 3 of the week's Top 5 biggest broadcast gainers in TV playback among Adults 18-49, with CBS and Fox having just one apiece (and NBC with zero), while also claiming 4 of the Top 10: Modern Family (+2.0 rating points) - #2, How to Get Away with Murder (+1.9) - #4, Scandal (+1.7) - #5 and Grey's Anatomy (+1.5) - #7.

Head to head in Thursday's 9pm hour, ABC's Scandal topped the L+7 gains of NBC's The Blacklist (+1.7 rating points vs. +1.6 rating points), while also increasing its lead over the NBC drama to nearly one full rating point (4.9 rating vs. 4.0 rating) in the L+7 numbers. In the first-reported L+SD ratings, Scandal led The Blacklist by 8-tenths of a rating point.

In Wednesday's 8:30pm half-hour, the debut of ABC's Fresh Off the Boat grew to a 3.4 Adult 18-49 rating (up +0.9 rating points) and pulled in 10.0 million Total Viewers (up +2.1 million viewers) after 7 days of playback. The new ABC comedy moved ahead of CBS' Mom (which had the benefit of a Big Bang lead-in) to finish as the week's #3 highest-rated sitcom among Adults 18-49, behind only Big Bang and Modern Family. Meanwhile, its The Middle lead-in at 8pm matched a season-high L+7 rating, with a 2.9 in Adults 18-49 (a gain of +0.7 rating points from its 2.2 L+SD rating).

Season-to-Date TV Playback (9/22/14-2/8/15):

Based on L+7 ratings through 20 weeks of the 2014-15 season, ABC grows to a 2.2 rating among Adults 18-49 in the non-sports numbers, ABC is even year to year (2.2 for 9/23/13-2/9/14), while CBS (-4%), NBC (-17%) and Fox (-14%) are each declining.

Based on TV playback data for the 2014-15 season, ABC's How to Get Away with Murder (+2.1 rating points) and Modern Family (+2.1) share the #2 spot among broadcast gainers in Adults 18-49.

ABC's HTGAWM is the season's biggest gainer for any freshman series among Adults 18-49 (+2.1 rating points), topping the L+7 gains of runner-ups Fox's Empire (+1.8) and Gotham (+1.7). In fact, the L+7 lift for HTGAWM is outdelivering the lift of last season's top freshman gainer through the same point last season, NBC's The Blacklist (+2.0).

Among Adults 18-49 in the L+7 ratings, ABC has the Top 3 dramas on Thursday with HTGAWM (5.1), Scandal (4.8) and Grey's Anatomy (4.0), the #1 show on Friday with Shark Tank (2.6) and the #1 broadcast series on Sunday with Once Upon a Time (3.7).

Several ABC's returning series are seeing bigger percentage gains among Adults 18-49 from L+SD to L+7 this year than last: The Bachelor (+32% vs. +24%), Castle (+69% vs. +65%), Last Man Standing (+46% vs. +36%), Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (+76% vs. +59%), The Middle (+35% vs. +23%), Modern Family (+62% vs. +54%), Nashville (+71% vs. +69%), Revenge (+91% vs. +63%), Scandal (+50% vs. +48%) and Shark Tank (+37% vs. +30%).

Source: The Nielsen Company, as dated. Based on regular, original telecasts only. Season-to-Date DVR playback ranker includes programs with 2 or more telecasts.