zipboy Posted March 5, 2006 Report Share Posted March 5, 2006 Final attendance numbers for MAC games only. Again, I feel this is a better barometer when students are mostly in session and it is tough to compare when some teams play a big non conference foe while others do not. Overall, avg attendance for the league was 34131. ohio 56352. toledo 45083. ball 43964. buffalo 42175. Can't 40576. akron 37937. miami 36978. wmu 33709. niu 212210 cmu 199911 bg 181312 emu 1347Including non conference games, our attendance was 3470 which is 7th highest in school history (assuming pre JAR days are lower than this).A few thoughts after seeing these numbers1. I always had the perception how bad we are relative to the rest of the league. Relative to being the national power where KD will take us, there is a lot of work to do. I look at 5K as the magical number to put us in the top 100 of the country. But relative to the rest of the league, we are very solid. Anyone singling us out from another school is ignorant.2. We were only lower than 2350 once in school history, the last year of the Coleman Crawford era, my senior year in Akron. Even if your team is bad, the bottom 4 have a lot of work to do. From a league standpoint, everyone needs to average at least 3K.3. I like NIU, but I guess they are not a bball school. Great support in football. They won the MAC West, beat DePaul and Kan State, and they want to fire their coach and have pretty low attendance numbers. But they are one of the best in the league for football support.4. Kudos to Ohio. A lot of that has to do with their students who show up in droves. From a paying customer standpoint, my guess is that we have about the same support as everyone else in the top 8 or close to it. Also kudos to Buffalo who have really gained a stable crowd.5. Non conference games never draw well. Keep the local teams, CSU, YSU and 2 other home and homes. Play everything else on neutral court tournaments. It will improve our RPI, give us a chance for some name wins, and make overall attendance better.6. In Dan Hipshers' last year, we had bottomed out to 2500 fans per game. In only 2 years. we have seen a 39% increase in attendance. I look for next year in football and bball to show big jumps. Just getting another 200 students per game and 200 paying customers per game will put us near the Buffalo, Ball, and Toledo group. I love the MAC, but if the MAC loses their top 3-4 teams over the next few years, I want to be part of that group. Good attendance in both football and bball is key. Go Zips! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
liljc Posted March 5, 2006 Report Share Posted March 5, 2006 Zips fans have some work to do. No reason those number can't be better in the next few seasons. The new football stadium will certainly help. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GP1 Posted March 5, 2006 Report Share Posted March 5, 2006 I had no idea that as a league the attendance was so bad. That's really embarassing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GoZips88 Posted March 6, 2006 Report Share Posted March 6, 2006 BG and NIU so low?! What else is there to do out in the middle of corn fields? OU - I get that - drink, go to game, leave at halftime, go drink some more. Definitely nothing else to do down there. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FearTheRoo Posted March 6, 2006 Report Share Posted March 6, 2006 Great post.I agree. We will squeek a few hundred out of the community as the word continues to travel, but the students have to make a bigger showing next year. I know others have said that as they build more dorms it will get better since there is such a high commuter factor, but there are thousands who already live in dorms! We need to find ways to get them out. Winning is always the number on e way. We need to come up with number two, three and four! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Captain Kangaroo Posted March 6, 2006 Report Share Posted March 6, 2006 The topic of "How can we generate more basketball attendance?" truely baffles me. Our attendance is on a dramatic upswing. We sold out the JAR for our final two home games of 2006. Student attendance was outstanding this season, and has major "upside."Next season we will be the favorites to win the MAC hoops title. We will have Nevada at home. Average attendance next season will easily be 4,400. That, from the "bandwagon factor" alone.The University doesn't need to do ANYTHING special to raise home hoops attendance in 2006. The team simply needs to achieve to it's capabilities and the Marketing crew needs to put forth the same effort they did in 2005-6. It is as simple as that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
msopher Posted March 6, 2006 Report Share Posted March 6, 2006 Toledo averaged over 4,000 per game? That's a shock. Those attendance figures are a bit embarrasing and I think every team in the conference has some work to do in this area. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FearTheRoo Posted March 6, 2006 Report Share Posted March 6, 2006 I agree that much of the work will be done on the court to get butts in the seats next year. We here need to keep inviting, bringin and forcing friends and family to games. I took many people to their first ZIPS game this year. We also need to buy season tickets to suppor the team. If you can't make all the games, then sell or even GIVE away the tickets. Don't look at it as a financial loss for yourself. Look at it as the cost of a true fan pays to support their team. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sloopy Posted March 6, 2006 Report Share Posted March 6, 2006 Winning at the Gund this week would help build that base. With all of the football success I expect at least 10,000 season tickets next year and 3,000 basketball season tickets. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DrZips Posted March 6, 2006 Report Share Posted March 6, 2006 Winning at the Gund this week would help build that base. With all of the football success I expect at least 10,000 season tickets next year and 3,000 basketball season tickets. That might be a bit of a stretch. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.