ELEAGUE has released viewership numbers for its first season, and although its TV ratings show it won't be competing with basketball for airtime anytime soon, league organizers say they reached their goal of expanding TBS's audience to a segment they wouldn't normally reach.

ELEAGUE was telecast on TBS for 10 weeks and earned 19 million viewers, 3.4 million of whom were completely new to TBS, according to a press release. In terms of demographics, the station saw a 97 per cent increase in men aged 18-34 during the Friday night window when ELEAGUE aired.

ELEAGUE estimates that across the season, its live event coverage received 25 million views on Twitch, and was watched for 15 million hours on TV and livestream combined.

The livestream of the Grand Finals Saturday peaked at 168,500 concurrent Twitch viewers, while maintaining an average of 103,000 concurrent viewers, the highest average ELEAGUE saw during the season. However, according to Nielsen ratings shared by Sports TV Ratings, the Grand Finals drew fewer TV viewers than the semifinals on Friday. Saturday's event drew 201,000 viewers total, down from 295,000 viewers the day before. For comparison, EVO's Sunday night finals on ESPN 2 pulled in 201,000 viewers, per the same source.

ELEAGUE general manager, Christina Alejandre, speaking to Slingshot Esports, said that the total number of TV viewers was secondary for Turner, and that they were more focused on opening up a new market.

"A big thing for us is opening it up to that broader audience," she told Slingshot. "We look at that, and we think we have been hugely successful. We have added 3.4 million viewers to TBS, and those are viewers who would normally have not gone to TBS if it wasn’t for ELEAGUE."

Alejandre goes on to say that traditional TV provides a familiar place for non-gamers to learn about esports, without having to learn the intricacies of Twitch.

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Virtus.Pro won the ELEAGUE Season 1 Grand Finals 2-0 over Fnatic, earning a $390,000 grand prize. VP won the first map, Cobble, 16-10 and the second map, Mirage, 16-8. The Polish team swept all challengers in the playoffs, including NIP in the quarterfinals and mouseports in the semis.

Sasha Erfanian is a news editor for theScore esports. Follow him on Twitter, it'll be great for his self-esteem.