SUPER BOWL SHEDS VIEWERS, STILL SETS RECORD

Ordinarily a football game that appears to be a blowout for one of the teams quickly loses its audience. Those who were cheering for the winning side conclude that they’ve already won the office pool. Those fans of the losers can’t bear the torture of seeing their heroes fall. To a certain degree that was the case with Sunday’s Super Bowl. While the game between the Seattle Seahawks and the Denver Broncos averaged 111.5 million viewers for Fox — the biggest audience for any show in television history — only 81 million were still tuned in during the final half hour. That wasn’t the case in 2012 when the previous record was set, with 111.3 million when the New York Giants beat the New England Patriots 21-17. Last year’s game, which also had a close 34-31 score, drew 108.7 million viewers who watched the Baltimore Ravens beat the San Francisco 49ers. Sunday’s game also produced a record for the halftime show, attracting 115.3 million viewers — especially impressive given the fact that Bruno Mars did not have the superstardom status that many previous halftime performers did. The previous record was set by Madonna last year when a record 114 million viewers tuned in.