FYI - NCAA Attendance - 2013

[EJHarrington]

FYI. Attached is a PDF file showing a list of average attendance by FBS program for 2009-2013. For purposes of sorting by Conference, I assigned teams to Conference based on latest information as to where they ultimately will end up (as opposed to where they played this year). My main takeaway with respect to UCONN: PP's incompetence eroded 20% of the fan base. The good news is we very well may have hired someone who can recover these fans and more...

 

[Chin Diesel]

Without even looking at it's going to be misleading since some schools count paid attendance and some use tickets sold

 

[sportsart]

Those numbers are alarming, but.....22K and 17K will do that to an average.

I get the feeling HCBD is not going to stop talking to anyone who listens and he won't stop talking until kick off vs BYU. I think it's great we start with BYU, thought the day it falls on sucks. But at least it will be an important game to build towards.

If we can be competitive and be heading towards bowl illegible in the last month, there is no reason we can't get back up to 35K. Only time will tell.

If Diaco was smart, and I think he is, he would spend a whole lot of extra time on the Gold Coast this coming off season and beyond.

 

[freescooter]

Without analyzing this in too much detail, a few trends I think I see are:
1. It sometimes takes a couple of years of winning to bring the fans back. My guess is that they take a more or less wait and see attitude early in the process.
2. Teams that struggle lose fans pretty much across the board. Doesn't matter if you're Texas or Temple. If you don't win you will see a drop off.
3. The new teams that were added to the AAC, with few exceptions, don't draw flies, even when they have pretty good teams. How does Houston not do better than mid-20s? Tulsa, Tulane and SMU gets MAC/Sunbelt level attendance even when they have good teams. Did anybody consider that fact when they put this mess together? Improving attendance needs to be high on the list of priorities for our esteemed commissioner.
4.One wonders what Memphis would draw if they actually had a football team instead of a team that carries the warning: Caution, may contain small amounts of football like substance.

 

[Carl Spackler]

The first thing I notice is that in the five year period 2009-2013 the majority of programs in the country have seen decreases in attendance which on quick glance looks to be in the 10% range of 2009 numbers +/- a couple percentage points across the board. There is clearly something happening here broadscope. A few programs jump out with big increases, Louisville - Stanford, but the majority are level, or decreased at around a 10% clip.

UCONN - from 2010 to 2013 saw approximately a 20% decrease in attendance. It might be the biggest drop percentage wise across the board - not sure - but its big.

Most likely that number would be higher if we didn't have Michigan on the schedule in 2013. THis is just my opinion as well, but it's almost like UCONN for some reason switched from reporting tickets sold to actual gate counts for the final few home games in 2013. So that's another point - what are these numbers? Tickets sold or gate count?

The last reported sell out (aside from Michigan) was final game of the 2010 season against Cincy. We reported sell outs a few times in 2010 as we did each year previously at Rentschler. While not always sold out, we reported sellouts regularly up through 2010, usually 3-4 a year. It's only 2011, 2012 where we didn't have at least one sellout, and 2013, the only year we had only one sellout in the 10 year history of Rentschler.

Those three years were undisputably the worst 3 years of football since Rentschler opened. We start winning and have some energy in the program again, and the stadium will fill up again.

It is very important for this program to win at home though, there are just too many other things for CT people to do, rather than go and spend a day of football for a loser, and the die hards have only had one generation barely to grow so far from the numbers that attended football games prior to 2003 and the first game at Rentschler. It's going to take another 2 generations or so to fill up a 40k stadium with regular diehards.

Factor in the ugly death of the Big East conference, and our place in the aftermath, and a 20% drop? Could have been a lot worse. We can get that stadium rocking again, easy. But we need winning football.

 

[NavinRJohnson]

The opener against BYU should be a 7pm start on ESPN. ESPN typically has a double header that night with a west coast game at 9:30 or so.

 

[jbdphi]

Without even looking at it's going to be misleading since some schools count paid attendance and some use tickets sold

It's still instructive from a trend perspective. Certainly looking at UConn, Cincinnati and USF, you can see what's happened there. Even Cincy which has had some very good seasons, has seen a marked decline in attendance over the past four years. USF has fallen off the cliff (you can probably thank Skip Holtz and the conference mash-up there) and so has UConn (PP / AAC double impact).

On the other hand, UCF has seen an increase as has Memphis.

The most confusing thing to me is SMU. How a Texas football team can be that unpopular is mind boggling and its still going downhill even with June Jones at the helm. High school programs can outdraw them.

 

[SubbaBub]

The last three home games really tanked the attendance number. If you go game by game until then, it's not as bad. Gives some hope that a full energy bucket brings em back.

 

[whaler11]

The last three home games really tanked the attendance number. If you go game by game until then, it's not as bad. Gives some hope that a full energy bucket brings em back.

Halfway through the year they changed how they report. The attendance for Towson would have been 21k in the new methodology.

 

[Carl Spackler]

Halfway through the year they changed how they report. The attendance for Towson would have been 21k in the new methodology.

Are you sure about this? Just wondering. I'm not sure, but I already remarked that it sure seems like they did. My guess is after the Michigan game about, they started reported actual gate counts instead tickets sold. I'm pretty sure that homecoming was an actual count, and there is no doubt that Rutgers and Memphis were actual counts. Towson, I agree, was not an actual reported count.

I have ideas as to why they would do this from a public relations standpoint moving forward, but if my idea is on track, it's disappointing because it's pretty bush league if they decided to report actual gate counts for the 2nd half of 2013, and go back to tickets sold in 2014 in an effort to make it look like things have changed dramatically.

CT yankees aren't dumb.

However they report, they need to be consistent. I think. Curious as to why they would switch mid season.

 

[whaler11]

It looks pretty obvious it changed between South Florida and Louisville which would align with the start of basketball season.

 

[EdgewoodNHV]

3. The new teams that were added to the AAC, with few exceptions, don't draw flies, even when they have pretty good teams. How does Houston not do better than mid-20s? Tulsa, Tulane and SMU gets MAC/Sunbelt level attendance even when they have good teams. Did anybody consider that fact when they put this mess together? Improving attendance needs to be high on the list of priorities for our esteemed commissioner.

What was the alternative? Are you aware of any programs which put 50K into a stadium which are going to be attracted to the AAC?

 

[freescooter]

What was the alternative? Are you aware of any programs which put 50K into a stadium which are going to be attracted to the AAC?

That's a good point, but I almost think I agree with nelson, and you don't know how it pains me to say that, and would have added UMass and maybe one of the Eastern MACs (Buffalo?) or if you're bringing in Navy mighgt as well add Air force too. Or Army. At least there are people actually watching their games. If you can't draw flies and you're playing in Texas I have to wonder what your upside is. I've always wondered what the upside for Tulane and Tulsa might be.

 

[Carl Spackler]

It looks pretty obvious it changed between South Florida and Louisville which would align with the start of basketball season.

I concur. It happened. I actually prefer publishing actual gate counts. They are well aware internally in Storrs, of how many seats are/were sold, to any event. The actual gate counts leave no room for ambiguity in the court of public opinion as to the product and the interest, and actually provides a pretty good accountability factor for the entire athletic department if those numbers are going public. Either way is fine, reporting tickets sold or actual gate count, my point is just be consistent.

I'm sure there was a reason for the change, and I have no idea what it is. No big deal. I hope the reason, as I said, is not so that when they report attendance in the fall, they can go back to tickets sold and project like there is some kind of huge change for positive PR from the close of 2013. That would be a University of New Jersey kind of thing to do.

 

[whaler11]

I concur. It happened. I actually prefer publishing actual gate counts. They are well aware internally in Storrs, of how many seats are/were sold, to any event. The actual gate counts leave no room for ambiguity in the court of public opinion as to the product and the interest, and actually provides a pretty good accountability factor for the entire athletic department if those numbers are going public. Either way is fine, reporting tickets sold or actual gate count, my point is just be consistent.

I'm sure there was a reason for the change, and I have no idea what it is. No big deal. I hope the reason, as I said, is not so that when they report attendance in the fall, they can go back to tickets sold and project like there is some kind of huge change for positive PR from the close of 2013. That would be a University of New Jersey kind of thing to do.

I doubt it's some scheme since they are doing it in basketball too.

 

[WestHartHusk]

Just publish tickets sold if everyone else is - why are we giving ourselves a black-eye? Miami has no problem reporting 50,000 attendance when it is clear from the broadcasts that 15,000 are in the stadium.

 

[Carl Spackler]

I doubt it's some scheme since they are doing it in basketball too.

I guess I'm just conditioned by years of Lew Perkins and Jeff Hathaway to naturally think there would be some kind of CYA PR scheme going on.

 

[MidTown Husky]

Only 3 power 5 conference schools listed below UConn. Gotta get to the Rent folks...

 

[Irishfan]

Rutgers counts actual attendance because when they give away 10,000 tickets to students it looks like they are selling out the stadium. Total ticket revenues are down while "attendance" is up. ND counts tickets sold, they tend to be more money driven.

 

[Carl Spackler]

There is nothing inherently wrong IMNSHO with reporting attendance either as tickets sold, or as actual gate counts. Either way is fine and has it's good and bad and reasons for doing it. The only difference is the kind of questions you need to answer that get generated from people that observe those kinds of things. If the University of New Jersey wants to report that they had a 50,000 gate count for a football game, that's fine, they'll have to also announce a 382 total count for a basketball game Including players and staff) if they're going to be consistent.

That's fine, people that pay attention will ask questions and figure out that 25,000 of those tickets were freebies. That will mean something to someone. THey'll also look at the basketball attendance be like WTF? Hello big 10? What were you thinking?

If Notre Dame (like UConn did historically with Rentschler field as it appears up to mid-season 2013) wants to report ticket sales rather than gate count- that's fine too - and announced attendance is more of a revenue statement, than an attendance figure. When the announced figure and the actual number of people in the seats aren't in the same ballpark, then other questions will arise, the answers to which will mean something to someone.

I just want consistency, playing games with numbers like that, to me - is just annoying.

 

[buggsy]

Rutgers counts actual attendance because when they give away 10,000 tickets to students it looks like they are selling out the stadium. Total ticket revenues are down while "attendance" is up. ND counts tickets sold, they tend to be more money driven.

Nice try Irish jackoff, but RU does NOT give away 10,000 tickets to students. Students pay for them in the form of student fees, so they are still paying for them.

 

[Carl Spackler]

Holy crap - SUNJ people are incredible.

 

[Irishfan]

Nice try Irish jackoff, but RU does NOT give away 10,000 tickets to students. Students pay for them in the form of student fees, so they are still paying for them.

I got my information from an article on a "my central Jersey.com" Website article dated 11/11/13 under the heading "Scarlet scuttlebutt". The article was titled something along the lines of "Rutgers raises the price of Big Ten Football tickets while still giving away thousands per game". In that article it states that they average giving away 20% of the tickets for each game, and actually giving away over 30% of the tickets for one of the games.

So while I don't doubt that your comment is correct, it is "Scarlet Scuttlebutt" that is passing out the incorrect information.

 

[huskymedic]

I got my information from an article on a "my central Jersey.com" Website article dated 11/11/13 under the heading "Scarlet scuttlebutt". The article was titled something along the lines of "Rutgers raises the price of Big Ten Football tickets while still giving away thousands per game". In that article it states that they average giving away 20% of the tickets for each game, and actually giving away over 30% of the tickets for one of the games.

So while I don't doubt that your comment is correct, it is "Scarlet Scuttlebutt" that is passing out the incorrect information.

You must be talking about this article http://www.dailyrecord.com/article/20131111/NJSPORTS0210/311110026/ ??

 

[Irishfan]

You must be talking about this article http://www.dailyrecord.com/article/20131111/NJSPORTS0210/311110026/ ??

It wasn't the same article, but it looks like these people at the daily record are operating under the same illusions as the ones at Scarlet Scuttlebutt. Buggsy needs to get going, it appears that the New Jersey press has no clue of what's going on at Rutgers. I wonder why everyone but Buggsy thinks Rutgers is giving the tickets away.