TV Ratings: ABC's "Private Practice" Carries the Night

The "Grey's Anatomy" spin-off may have been panned by a number of fans and critics, but the extended 2-hour episode of ABC's hit drama (along with a stronger "Ugly Betty") helped the network sweep competition.

"Ugly Betty" started things off at 8 p.m. with 10.71 million viewers, still below season-average, but over a million viewers stronger than last week. "Survivor" won the timeslot with 13.72 million.

"Grey's" averaged 20.97 million viewers from 9-11 p.m. Although that made the drama the #1 telecast of the evening, the highly anticipated episode failed to deliver the kind of audience that attracted the conclusion of the 3-episode ferryboat fire arc back in February (27.29 million.)

CSI, on the other hand, fared much worse pulling in 18.88 million viewers, while its 18-49 rating was way below "Grey's'" (5.5 vs. 9.0) Also, one year ago the drama averaged over 26 million viewers.

NBC's comedy line-up was super-sized last night which makes it difficult to crunch the numbers, but we do know "My Name Is Earl" scored over 7 million viewers, while "The Office" did very well in the 18-49 demo.

"Grey's" second hour easily beat "Shark" on CBS (12,66 million,) while NBC's "ER" was the drama most affected by ABC's stunt plummeting to only 8 million viewers. The time has come to end the 13-year old drama that once averaged 20-30 million viewers. Next season therefore may very well be the show's final.

Over on the CW, a 1940s inspired episode of "Smallville" dipped to a disappointing 3.55 million viewers. Its lead-out "Supernatural" posted 3.16 million, retaining almost 90% of the "Noir" audience.

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