'Lost' finale lifts ABC

Season-ender tops Thursday night ratings

By RICK KISSELL

Although it set a new low water-mark for season-enders, the fourth-season finale of ABC's "Lost" was easily the top-rated program on Thursday, a night that also saw another good performance from Fox's "So You Think You Can Dance."

According to preliminary nationals from Nielsen, "Lost" wrapped its season with a two-hour episode that averaged a 4.9 rating/13 share in adults 18-49 and 12.2 million viewers overall, building with each half-hour and peaking with a 5.3/15 in the demo from 10:30 to 11. The series, which aired its finale two weeks after the final Thursday of the season, was down 17% vs. its May 2007 finale on a Wednesday (5.9/15 in 18-49, 13.9 million viewers overall).

The only other broadcast program to do much Thursday was Fox's "So You Think You Can Dance" (3.6/11 in 18-49, 9.4 million viewers overall), which was up a tick vs. its Thursday premiere of the previous week. Head to head in demos, it more than doubled Fox's reality competitor "Dance."

TNT's coverage of the NBA playoff game between the Los Angeles Lakers and San Antonio Spurs will likely come in as the No. 3 program of the night when nationals are released Friday afternoon.

NBC again saw weak scores for unscripted competition series "Last Comic Standing" (1.8/5 in 18-49, 4.4 million viewers overall), which aired in the unusual 8:30-10:30 p.m. time period. CBS, meanwhile, was paced by repeats of dramas "CSI" (2.1/6 in 18-49, 8.7 million viewers overall) and "Without a Trace" (2.1/6 in 18-49, 8.4 million viewers overall).

Preliminary 18-49 averages for the night: ABC, 4.0/11; Fox, 3.6/11; CBS, 1.9/6; NBC, 1.7/5; Univision, 1.5/4; CW, 0.6/2.

In total viewers: ABC, 10.4 million; Fox, 9.4 million; CBS, 7.3 million; NBC, 4.1 million; Univision, 3.7 million; CW, 1.7 million.