The much anticipated Christmas day matchup featuring the Los Angeles Lakers and the Miami Heat was the highest rated regular season basketball game in almost 7 years, ABC television said on Monday.

As per Nielsen Media Research ratings, the game surpassed all regular season games dating back to February of 1998, as well as all Christmas Day pairings since 1996.

The game drew a rating of 8, where each point represents a single percent of the 109.6 nationwide homes.