Prime Time Preliminary Monday Ratings

Eight premieres dotted the broadcast landscape last night, with "Heroes" sliding 25% from its previous opening last year, while CBS grabbed the nightly win thanks to its comedy block. This is the first time since 2002 that CBS has won premiere-week Monday in adults 18-49. Thanks to the season debut of "Dancing With the Stars," ABC averaged 17.2 million total viewers, its highest Monday premiere since 1999.

	8	8:30	9	9:30	10	10:30
4.3 / 11	Dancing With the Stars 5.3 / 13 21.1 mil				Boston Legal 2.5 / 6 9.4 mil
4.5 / 11	Big Bang Theory 3.6 / 10 9.4 mil	How I Met Your Mother 4.0 / 10 9.7 mil	Two and a Half Men 5.3 / 12 14.9 mil	Worst Week 3.8 / 9 11 mil	CSI: Miami 5.1 / 12 16.9 mil
4.1 / 10	Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles 2.2 / 6 5.8 mil		Prison Break 2.5 / 6 5.9 mil		No Programming
2.4 / 6	Heroes: Countdown 2.6 / 7 6 mil		Heroes 4.9 / 12 9.9 mil
1.5 / 4	Gossip Girl 1.6 / 4 3.4 mil		One Tree Hill 1.5 / 3 3.1 mil		No Programming

Source: Nielsen Media Research

*Ratings are specified in the 18-to 49-year-old demographic and viewership in P2+.

A note about ratings: Ratings are expressed as percentages of Nielsen's estimated 112.8 million U.S. television households. The first number, the rating, is a percentage of households tuned into a specific program at a specific time.

The second number, the share, is a percentage of households with televisions in use tuned into that same program. For example, if a show obtains a 10.2/16, this means that 10.2% of all U.S. households tuned into the program at some point during the broadcast. Meanwhile, 16% of all households watching television during the time period viewed the program at some point. Ratings are broken down further by demographic, as networks sell advertising time based on the makeup of the audience.