Through the first half of the divisional round, the trend has not been the NFL’s friend.

The total audience for the two Saturday playoff games was down from the year ago.

The Saturday afternoon audience was up, from 32.3 million for Texans-Ravens a year ago. According to ESPN, Saturday’s Texans-Chiefs multicast on ESPN, ABC, and ESPN+ generated an average audience of 32.7 million. That’s a 1.2-percent increase over last year.

With the Ravens were swapped out for the Chiefs, some would have expected a bigger bump with Kansas City in the mix instead of Baltimore. (The numbers for the Sunday night game will confirm or debunk that dynamic. Last year, it was Chiefs-Bills — and 50.39 million viewers. This year, it was Ravens-Bills.)

Meanwhile, last year’s Packers-49ers game on Fox averaged 37.5 million. This time around, Commanders-Lions shootout dipped to 33.6 million. That’s a 10.4-percent decline.

Putting the two games together, the Saturday audience fell from 69.8 million to 66.3 million, a five-percent dip.

Sunday’s numbers have yet to be released. Last year, NBC drew 40.4 million for Buccaneers-Lions in the early game. This year, it was Rams-Eagles in the same spot. And it was, as mentioned above, 50.39 million for Chiefs-Bills on CBS a year ago.

How close will Ravens-Bills come to that number?

The four divisional-round games averaged 40 million in all a year ago. To get there, an average of 46.85 million for the Sunday games is needed.