Discovery's 'Gold Rush' Outperforms Every Friday Series on Broadcast Nets

Discovery

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Catapulted by a season-high showing among adults 18-49, Discovery's Gold Rush bested all series on broadcast networks on Friday night, Nov. 30, with a 1.9 rating. Its closest competition, CBS' Undercover Boss, pulled a 1.8 rating in the key demo. (Gold Rush also dominated all English-language cable broadcasts, coming shy of only Univision's Amores Verdaderos.)

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Gold Rush, Discovery's highest-rated series, has enjoyed an especially strong third season since premiering Oct. 26. In all of the male demos, it helped Discovery win Fridays throughout the November sweep. And in the targeted adults 18-49 group, the network even outperformed Fox.

The series, strong as it might be, owes Shark Tank a bit of a gratitude for its latest bragging right. The ABC reality competition is usually the night's top performer, but Friday's episode was a repeat.

In total viewers, Gold Rush bought in 4.6 million viewers.

Friday is now one of several nights seeing huge cable advantages over the broadcast networks. Sunday night's midseason finale of AMC's The Walking Dead blew everything but NBC's Sunday Night Football out of the water. On Tuesdays, Sons of Anarchy has been rivaling its broadcast competition at 10 p.m. -- much like A&E's surprise hit Duck Dynasty, which has performed similarly well in the same hour on Wednesdays.