The week that was

Dennis Swanson, new executive vice president and chief operating officer for Viacom's TV-stations group and former general manager of WNBC(TV), has been selected by the John A. Reisenbach Foundation to receive its prestigious Distinguished Citizen Award.

He'll be honored at The Reisenbach Foundation's 11th annual Gala for a Better and Safer New York on Dec. 10 at New York's Rainbow Room. Tickets start at $500. For information, call 212-935-1840. The foundation has given more than $3.5 million to programs that improve the quality of life in New York. …

CBS debuted its revamped Early Show, with no appreciable difference in ratings. The new version, hosted by Harry Smith, Julie Chen, Hannah Storm and René Syler, carved a 2.2 rating/7 share last Monday, which was 0.1 better than the week before. …

Stephanie Leifer has been named senior VP of comedy programming at ABC. This season, she oversaw the development of the Tuesday-night lineup of 8 Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter, Life With Bonnie and Less Than Perfect and midseason entries Lost at Home and Regular Joe. Leifer was named VP of comedy development for the network in July 1999. …

Bad news for wannabe networks: Cox Communications is backing off digital cable. During last week's earnings call, CEO James Robbins said the company is getting a better return on capital from new high-speed Internet and telephone service. CFO Jimmy Hayes noted that the company's digital penetration is a high 27% but "we have slowed spending on Cox Digital Cable."

ESPN is working on several new shows, including Cold Pizza, a morning show for ESPN2 that is being billed as the Good Morning America of sports and will feature news, cooking and fashion stories— all with a sports twist. That begins next October. Also in the incubator: a magazine show, Outside the Lines Nightly; a call-in show, Drive Time; a talk show, Around the Horn; and animated shorts inspired by the comic strip Bleachers. …

Fox Sports Net will dabble in the extreme-sports arena with a new highlight show, 54321 , bowing Jan. 27. …

The National Basketball Association has signed its first distribution deal, with EchoStar , for NBATV, launching in 2003.

ABC Family is bringing back last summer's reality miniseries, The Last Resort, for a full 15-week run in January. The cable network will team it with another original reality show, My Life as a Sitcom. …

Bram and Alice will be the first new CBS show of the fall season to be canceled, sources say, although CBS spokesfolk say they've had no word of the Sunday sitcom's demise. …

But Fox is sure about axing Girls Club, the David E. Kelley Monday drama, after only two outings. …

Speaking of axes, VH1 has canceled its upcoming reality show with newlyweds Liza Minnelli and David Gest. The show was slated for a December premiere, then pushed back to January. …

CBS ordered full seasons of new shows CSI: Miami, Still Standing, Without a Trace and Hack. …

Pax TV has picked up the back-nine episodes of Sue Thomas: F.B.Eye. Its debut was the network's highest-rated premiere of the season.

This year's World Series averaged an 11.9 household rating and a 20 share, setting a new record low, 4% below the 2000 Series, the previous record holder. In terms of total viewership, this year's Series was slightly better than the 2000 Series, with an average audience of about 19.3 million, 6% higher than two years ago. Fox put up the best viewing stats for Game 7, which drew an estimated 57.9 million viewers and easily won the Sunday-night competition.

Overall, the Series gave Fox its first weekly win for the season, in households, total viewers and adults 18-49, ending CBS's win streak at four weeks. For the week, Fox averaged a 10.4 rating/16 share in households in prime, beating second-place CBS by 24%. Among adults 18-49, Fox was first, with a 36% advantage over second-place NBC.

The story "Plug-and-play is on the way," on page 42 of the Oct. 28 edition, misspelled Philips Electronics and Thomson Electronics.

The cable channel formerly known as the National College Sports Network will launch as College Sports Television and will be housed in a street-front studio at Manhattan's Chelsea Piers. Names rejected: College Sports Network, Varsity: The College Sports Network and College Sports Channel. CSTV moves into its 20,000-square-foot facility this month and expects to launch on Feb. 23. It doesn't have any carriage deals yet but has programming pacts with conferences like the Big Ten, Big East and Western Athletic Conference.