I'm telling you, it's our kids. They have to be registered for some activity 52 weeks of the year and the geniuses running things figure they should take up our weekends.
that's why I've never been all that concerned with our capacity. 38000 in a 40,000 seat facility, or 43000 like for Michigan, is great. The place can really rock. The same crowd in a 55000 seat arena is lame and its awful in a 75000 house. Most of these huge stadiums were built in a very different era. If you wanted to see the game you had to go to the game. Now with the new technology, from online coverage to recording games to large screen hd tv, not to mention virtually every game available on something, it is possible to watch, and actually get a better view than is possible in the stadium. I agree that some of the electricity of actually being there is missing. But that's about all. And that doesn't even consider things like ticket prices, scheduling midweek night games that start at 8 pm in late November/December in New England, scheduling teams such that they go weeks and weeks without any home games, sometime multiple weeks without any games, and all sorts of other stuff that is done for tv. 2013 saw a slight increase in attendance after 3 consecutive years of decline among 1A schools. And a number of schools are seeing what could be a scary harbinger of the future, declining student ticket sales. Alabama, for example, didn't sell out its allotment of student tickets last year. Texas too. Penn State has seen attendance drop every year since 2009. the big programs continue to draw, of course. It is the middle tier in major conferences that don't necessarily do so well. Baylor had its best attendance in years last season at 45,900. And they had both Texas and Oklahoma on their home schedule and won the conference. Its good attendance but not even close to full capacity.
Those are all great things, but how does the state justify that kind of investment with only a single tenant, UConn, playing six games per year in that facility? You've got to have other tenants, maybe some kind of pro soccer team (MLS*?), concerts, and lots of other events to break even on that proposition. And I haven't seen the commitment to doing that yet.
No, since the IU opener I believe UCONN's always been on the sunny side.Waquoit said:
freescooter said:
No you are thinking of Memorial Stadium. Edsall moved to the sunny side after his first season.
A couple dozen schools (both on and off campus) sell beer. It's not an NCAA rule per se, but 100% of the onus is on the organizing body, i.e. who pays the bills. The NCAA did request arenas to suspend alcohol sales during the Basketball Tournaments and there was no beer on sale at MSG in March. Also, I believe most on campus venues were not originally build back in the day with beer sales in mind and lack the infrastructure. Off campus venues are traditionally not owned by the school and host other commercial events. So it is up to the school if they are to allow alcohol sales, but as I said, the onus for insurance, security, etc. is on the School and typically manifest itself through the rent payments...as I understand it.
You are correct. It is part of their Alcohol Policy regarding championships. But regular season, conference tournaments, and bowl games are left up to the respective home team and governing bodies. When I say it's not an NCAA rule per se, I'm referring to on campus venues.
