CTV says it will continue its ratings dominance with proven hits and a few hot pickups, while Global is promising growth with heavy drama after the first round of network upfronts early this month in Toronto.

CTV and Global parent CanWest MediaWorks previewed their 2006/07 seasons for advertisers on June 5 and June 7 (after Playback went to press), respectively.

CTV came back from this year’s L.A. screenings with four new dramas and three comedies for its fall sked, and most have a scheduling conflict with a returning CTV hit, curbing some potential new simulcasts that are generally attractive to media buyers and their clients.

Anxious viewers, anyway, will be happy that buzz drama Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip will air Sundays at 10 p.m., a day ahead of its Monday slot in the U.S. However, hot new comedies Let’s Rob… and 30 Rock will air back-to-back in the unenviable 9 p.m. and 9:30 p.m. Saturday slots, far from their weeknight slots on ABC and NBC, respectively. Hostage drama The Nine, which airs on Wednesday at 10 p.m. on ABC, will follow at 10 p.m.

CTV has also positioned Grey’s Anatomy an hour ahead of its ABC airing on Thursdays, which puts the drama head-to-head with Global’s popular Survivor at 8 p.m. As a result, CTV’s Thursday lineup is strong, sandwiching Grey’s and CSI with aging favorites The O.C. and ER in a 7 p.m. to 11 p.m. block.

There is also an overlap with its new Jerry Bruckheimer thriller Justice from Fox in the same Wednesday 9 p.m. timeslot as ABC’s Lost. CTV and ABC will temporarily beach the hit serial and CTV will simulcast Justice starting in late summer, until Fox begins running the World Series playoffs. When Fox puts Justice on hiatus for baseball, Lost will go to air. CTV could not confirm which show would continue in the slot after the baseball season.

Also new to CTV on Mondays are Smith at 9 p.m. – a heist drama starring Ray Liotta – and comedy The Class, which takes over for Degrassi: The Next Generation on Tuesday nights. (D:TNG will return after Dancing with the Stars wraps for the season.) Corner Gas will still air Mondays at 8 p.m., but is the lone Cancon series on CTV’s fall sked. The long-delayed second season of Instant Star, new drama Whistler and teen series Alice, I Think (already running on CTV’s Comedy Network) will begin airing over the summer.

‘CTV is going to stay number one,’ declared CTV CEO Ivan Fecan onstage at the Hummingbird Centre during the presentation. CTV dominated last year with its highly rated American series, including the CSIs, Desperate Housewives, Lost, and breakout hit Grey’s Anatomy.

The broadcaster is often accused of grabbing more programming than it needs in an effort to keep Global’s mitts off top prospects, but the network may have more than it can handle.

‘With the amount of stuff CTV has… how are they going to manage it all?’ asks Kim Dougherty, media manager at OMD. ‘The CTV lineup is definitely strong, as demonstrated by the fact that most of its big shows are coming back, but I do think with the schedule Global put together it has a good shot at making a huge leap.’

With so many returning and expected hits, CTV is ‘not afraid to make bold programming moves,’ said Suzanne Boyce, president of programming, at the upfront. ‘We’re not locked into simulcast.’

CTV also used its June 5 upfront to announce the acquisition of longtime CBC sportscaster Brian Williams. Williams will anchor the net’s 2010 and 2012 Olympics coverage and joins CTV after his contractual obligations to the Ceeb are met this winter.

The net also announced some new media initiatives, including an ad-supported broadband service through its redesigned website, offering full episodes of CTV originals immediately after they air on TV, and original mobile content relating to CTV properties.

Global, meanwhile, has revamped its 9 p.m. to 11 p.m. Monday and Wednesday lineups for the fall. Airing after the returning Prison Break on Monday are Vanished and Standoff, two Fox crime dramas, while ABC’s Six Degrees and NBC’s Kidnapped will run on Wednesdays following the returning Bones. The net will offer the NBC football drama Friday Night Lights on Tuesdays at 8 p.m., and the light ABC Calista Flockhart drama Brothers and Sisters on Sundays at 10 p.m. All except Standoff and Six Degrees are simulcasts.

‘The new series we’ve picked up at this year’s screenings are a great complement to our current roster of returning shows,’ says Barbara Williams, SVP, programming and production.

Global’s sister CH stations will air new comedies ‘Til Death, starring Everybody Loves Raymond’s Brad Garrett, and the wedding-themed Big Day on Wednesdays beginning at 8 p.m., and the TNT medical drama Saved, Thursdays at 10 p.m.

Amid the new and returning shows Global and CH have on their rosters, three proven titles – Without a Trace, My Name Is Earl and The Office – are conspicuously absent from Thursday nights, replaced by game show Deal or No Deal and the James Woods legal drama Shark in the 9 p.m. to 11 p.m. block. Withholding the shows is pure strategy, says Dougherty.

‘It means Global has something waiting in the wings,’ she says, adding that because the shows are episodic, not serial, Global can slip them into its lineup should something new fail.

Dougherty singles out Kidnapped, Let’s Rob… and Brothers and Sisters as potential hits based on reaction at the U.S. nets’ fall launches in New York. Media buying firm M2 Universal adds The Class, The Nine, Shark and 30 Rock to the list, according to a report it prepared in advance of the upfronts. Studio 60, thought by some to be this fall’s one to beat, can be found in the ‘The Jury is Still Out’ section.

Also according to the M2 document, supernaturally themed dramas are out, while comedies without laugh tracks, such as Rock and Rob, are in. Dougherty says there are also a lot of series that play with narrative timeframes, inspired by Fox’s 24, which returns mid-season on Global. CH’s Big Day, Global’s Kidnapped and mid-season drama Day Break – where a detective relives the same day over and over – are other examples.