Amid the fuss over Sunday's ambiguous conclusion as "The Sopranos" HBO television series, one stunning fact has been overlooked:

A taped program on a premium cable network outdrew two live events.

The Associated Press reported Neilsen ratings of 11.9 million viewers for "The Sopranos." That's not huge news. It's not even the most-watched episode in the show's history. Three episodes drew in excess of 12 million viewers, topped by the 13.4 million who watched the September 2002 premiere of season four.

Meanwhile, the second game of the NBA Finals - featuring future Hall-of-Famer Tim Duncan and the latest "next Michael Jordan," LeBron James - averaged just 7.7 million viewers. And the Tony Awards, honoring Broadway's best performances from the past year, attracted 6.2 million viewers.

One could dismiss the nonperformance from the Tonys. Always the little sister among the awards shows, the Tonys don't compare to the Academy Awards (40 million viewers this year) or even the Grammys (20 million people watched the music awards show).

Heck, the Tony's didn't even make the front section of the Herald & Review, and part of that was due to my note to the editors on duty Sunday night: "It doesn't need to go on the front page, it just needs to get in somewhere." (Left unwritten was the thought that if Millikin University graduate Sierra Boggess, currently in rehearsals for her November Broadway premiere as the lead in the musical "The Little Mermaid," winds up with a nomination next year, we'll have to consider that for the front.)

Maybe the NBA numbers are a relief, particularly compared with the viewers the National Hockey League garnered on network television for its championship series earlier this month. Sport talk hosts from coast to coast had days worth of joke material as the NHL became the lowest-rated prime-time programming in NBC history, outdrawn even by "Build a Better Burger" on the Food Network.

We've turned into a fractured and fragmented television audience, with cable networks designed specifically for small groups. AVERAGING 12 million viewers for a season as recently as 10 years ago wouldn't have landed your show in the top 20.

But "The Sopranos" still drew at least 12 million. (Additional viewers, from recording devices and the additional HBO showings throughout the week, are not figured into the preliminary numbers.) That's from folks paying an extra fee on top of their dish or cable bill just to receive HBO. And that's from folks who decided - despite personal video recorders and additional viewing opportunities - it was more important to see the conclusion of the series than watch two live events.

How did that happen?

Simple. HBO and David Chase created the ultimate event. The anticipation for "The Sopranos" finale built to the point where viewers knew they HAD to watch. "The Sopranos" - not the NBA, certainly not the Tonys - were going to be the primary topic of discussion the next day. If you didn't want to be left out, you had to be on board.

That's a true rarity these days. How often does that happen nationwide with a television event any more? Maybe the Oscars, maybe the "American Idol" final (most of the other reality shows seem fairly played out, from a nationwide fanaticism point of view at least), definitely the Super Bowl. That's about it, right?

The Super Bowl has become a true triumph of style over substance, given the mediocre nature of many of the NFL championship showdown's games. The hype, the commercials - practically everything surrounding the game, and always not the game itself - have made it the one must-see television event of each year.

That's a pretty impressive marketing accomplishment, especially considering that the NFL features almost as many felons as the entire series run of "The Sopranos."

And the conclusion of the series almost created felons out of many of its fans. Perhaps it's a good thing creator David Chase was out of the country.

Now, you can make the argument (and many have) that a story contains a beginning, a middle and an end, and the finale of "The Sopranos" fails because it's not an ending. (Or you could get a little confused and write, as one poster on Time magazine TV critic James Poniewozik's site did, that "It's easy to create the first half of a riddle if you're sure you'll never have to make a punchline.")

But from my point of view, it's refreshing and thrilling that a work of art can leave people so incensed. Followers wanted a resolution, and they received one. They're simply angry they didn't receive the one they wanted.

That's great. Somewhere, P.T. Barnum is still smiling.

Tim Cain can be reached at timcain@herald-review.com or 421-6908.