Is It Me?

[Superneck]

so I just pulled the home game attendance numbers for this year.

Valpo 3584
Drake 9445
NDSU 5111
ISURed 4641

Who calculated this stuff or is it a mental math exercise for some intern? I cannot believe that the numbers at Homecoming (NDSU) were THAT low, although compared to previous years, it was disappointing considering it was against the #1 team in the nation...

and I cannot believe that the numbers at the ISURed game were a mere 500 less than Homecoming. The Powers that be certainly need to address attendance issues. Ironically, it cost me under $10 to buy a ticket for the game at Northwestern reserved ON the 50 yard line and it was $15 for me to get into my own Homecoming game. Weird. But if we cannot even get accurate numbers on who already is there, then where do we start?

[rocki]

I'm long enough in the tooth to remember when we went to games come hell or high water. It was THE thing to do.

Doesn't seem to be that way anymore, and both weekends you mentioned were not the best weather-wise. Last week wasn't rainy, but it was pretty chilly, and Homecoming was chilly and damp.

Malaise is rampant among the college fan bases - check the other message boards and you'll see we're not the only ones with attendance problems.

[sealhall74]

Every paying fan/student should walk through a turn-style which automatically does the counting. We should not be counting workers, media, and other freeloaders - they walk through a separate gate. Nothing too complicated about the process to get accurate numbers.

As for increasing those accurate numbers, the best thing that I can see is simply "win, win, win" to get them in the gate and "entertain, entertain, entertain" to keep them past half-time.

[ST_Lawson]

I'm pretty sure that it's less of a change in actual attendance than it is a change in how attendance is being counted.
Last year we had 10,232 for Homecoming (16,033 the year before), but I've been to all of the home games this year, as well as most of them the last few years. Actually, if my count is correct, I think I've only missed 8 home games since 1996 (most of which came after the kids showed up and schedules got a bit more crazy).

Anyway, I've seen crowds that have been "reported" as 19k (but were probably closer to 16k), crowds that were reported as at 1.2k (but were probably closer to 600), and everything in between. This year, attendance does appear to be down, although not significantly compared to last year. However, homecoming this year didn't feel much (if any) smaller than last year.

My guess is that they've changed the way they count fans...maybe actual bodies in the stadium vs # of tickets purchased. This is a likely a more accurate number and we'd seen more inflated numbers in the previous years.

It doesn't change the fact that attendance does appear to be down somewhat, no matter which numbers you use, but that's not unexpected given how few wins we've had in previous seasons. Winning more games will bring out more fans.