CBS rolls on Thursday

Morning Ratings Flash -- Rick Kissell

By RICK KISSELL

Another Thursday, another convincing ratings victory for CBS behind its vet trio of "Survivor," "CSI" and "Without a Trace," according to preliminary nationals from Nielsen. The Eye thumped second-place NBC by 72% in adults 18-49, by 82% in adults 25-54 and by 133% in total viewers.

"CSI" (8.2 rating/21 share in adults 18-49, 25.7 million viewers overall) was the night's top program as usual, more than doubling in demos NBC's second-place combo of "My Name is Earl" (4/11 in 18-49, 8.7 million viewers overall) and "The Office" (3.6/9 in 18-49, 7.5 million viewers overall) -- which posted their lowest scores since moving to Thursday in January.

"Survivor: Exile Island" remained steady at 8 and easily led its hour (5.9/18 in 18-49, 17.3 million viewers overall), and "Without a Trace" (5.9/15 in 18-49, 19.1 million viewers overall) opened up some distance at 10 on NBC's fading second-place "ER" (5.1/14 in 18-49, 11.7 million viewers overall).

Also falling on the night is ABC's once-promising "American Inventor" (2.6/7 in 18-49, 6.5 million viewers overall), which hit a series low even as it nears its finale. And at 10, "Primetime" (1.7/5 in 18-49, 5.3 million viewers overall) actually did worse than the since-booted "Commander in Chief" one week earlier.

Fox improved itself a bit at 8:30 with a second original episode of "That '70s Show" (2.6/8 in 18-49, 5.6 million viewers overall) but "The OC" again ran fourth at 9 (2.3/6 in 18-49, 5 million viewers overall).

Preliminary 18-49 averages for the night: CBS, 6.7/18; NBC, 3.9/11; Fox, 2.3/7; ABC, 2/6; WB, 1.7/5; UPN, 1.1/3.

In total viewers: CBS, 20.7 million; NBC, 8.9 million; ABC, 5.7 million; Fox, 5.1 million; WB, 4.1 million; UPN, 2.5 million.