With baseball out of the picture, Hugh Laurie was free to reclaim his reign over Wednesday night’s ratings.

8pm

• At 17.1 million, NCIS (3.7/10 in 18-49 demo) had the hour’s best audience and demo performance.
• Bones (3.1/9) came in 2nd with 8.8 million viewers.
• The Biggest Loser (6.9 million, 3.2/9) was up from last week; The Singing Bee (6.8 million, 2.3/7) did better than last week’s Dateline special.
• Both Cavemen (6.9 million, 2.2/6) and Carpoolers (7.1 million, 2.4/6) were about even from one week ago.
• Beauty and the Geek (3.2 million, 1.6/4) was slightly down.

9pm

• House (17.9 million, 7.6/18 in 18-49 demo) had the night’s largest numbers in both categories.
• Dancing With The Stars (17.8 million, 4.4/11) came in a close 2nd with viewers.
• The Unit (10.9 million, 3.0/7) was down from last week as was Reaper (2.6 million, 1.2/3).

10pm

• Law and Order: SVU (12.2 million, 4.7/13 in 18-49 demo) easily dominated the 10pm hour.
• A special episode of 20/20 (2.8/8) drew in 10.9 million.
• CBS’s Cane (8 million, 2.0/5) dropped another 500,000.