Hollywood’s biggest night was golden for CTV as the 81st Academy Awards surpassed both the Super Bowl and the World Junior Hockey Championship and, thus, put it on track to be the most-watched program of the year.

The Oscars grabbed 4.5 million viewers beginning at 8:30 p.m. Sunday, up slightly from last year’s broadcast, which drew 4.4 million. The ceremony peaked at 5.5 million viewers just after 10 p.m., when the late Heath Ledger won best supporting actor for his work as the psychotic Joker in The Dark Knight. His family was on hand to accept the award and paid an emotional tribute to Ledger — the second person to receive a posthumous Oscar.

Roughly 10 million Canadians tuned in during some part of the nearly four-hour broadcast, which saw Slumdog Millionaire grab the lion’s share of the prizes with eight golden statues. (All numbers 2+.)

The numbers for the Oscars were also up in the U.S., where an average 36 million Americans tuned in to ABC, which marks a respectable increase from 32 million in 2008, according to Variety. The Oscar-cast marked its highest ratings in two years in the U.S., though in Canada this year’s show did not beat the draw of 2007’s Academy Awards.

Meanwhile, Global drew 800,000 viewers for Barbara Walters’ pre-Oscar special at 7 p.m., up against stiff competition from CTV’s The Amazing Race, which aired out-of-simulcast to 1.4 million viewers. The numbers for the special are down from last year, when it aired to 1.8 million viewers on CTV. A Global spokesperson says the drop can be attributed to simulcast problems the broadcaster had in Western Canada.

The weekend was also hot on the ratings front for CBC, which scored an average 1.8 million viewers for the much-hyped Toronto Maple Leafs/Vancouver Canucks game at 7 p.m. — which was Mats Sundin’s first game in Toronto since he joined the Canucks in December.

It was the Ceeb’s highest audience for a regular season game since 2006/07, and the most-watched game of the season thus far. The game was the second in a triple-header as part of CBC’s annual Hockey Day in Canada event. The Ottawa/Montreal bout drew 620,000 viewers at 3 p.m., while Calgary/Edmonton nabbed 712,000 viewers at 10 p.m.