The PBA fever is really heating up as proven by the increased crowd attendance and the record-breaking high ratings the games are posting on TV5.

In fact, the currently running PLDT Home DSL PBA Philippine Cup Semifinals series between the San Mig Super Coffee Mixers and Ginebra San Miguel has reached its viewership peak last January 31 when it posted the highest rating for the PBA for a non-Finals game, based on data from Nielsen Media Research.

The Gin Kings overwhelmed the Coffee Mixers in Game 2 of the series with a score of 93-64. Rookie center Greg Slaughter posted monster numbers of 21 points, 12 rebounds, 1 assist and 1 block.

With 19,279 fans in attendance at the SMART Araneta Coliseum last January 31, the game at its peak averaged about 3.2 million viewers or 15% higher than GMA in NUTAM. In MEGATAM, where a critical number of urban viewers are measured, ratings surpassed the two other networks with TV5 claiming 8.7 AMR versus the 8.3 AMR of ABS-CBN and 7.8 AMR of GMA. The recent PBA viewership ratings on TV5 mark the highest ever for the league since 2007.

TV5 also claimed high viewership numbers in Visayas and Mindanao that evening. The Kapatid network garnered 33.8% audience share or 7.1% AMR in the Visayas versus GMA’s 14.9% audience share or 3.1% AMR. Meanwhile, Mindanano viewers were also tuned in to the game, as proven by TV5’s 23.7% audience share or 4.9% AMR against GMA’s 14.2% audience share or 2.9% AMR.

The PLDT Home DSL PBA Philippine Cup is sure to get more viewers as it enters the Finals stage next week and Sports5, the sports production arm of TV5, is all set to deliver the best local sports actions to millions of Filipinos as it has been doing since 2011.