Regionals attendance

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Re: Regionals attendance

Bruins on national tv, and Red Sox had a game also. BC doesn't fill their barn for a home game, let alone for a road game. Did they have their band there?

No Red Sox today. Do you mean Celtics?

Doubt that had much effect. Not every one lives as conveniently to Worcester as I do, but I had time to watch the Bruins game through the shootout, get to Worcester, and have a couple of beers before the game. And I don't think there's much crossover between Celtics fans and BC/UML hockey fans.

[Carmine Scarpaglia]

Re: Regionals attendance

BC doesn't fill their barn for a home game,

Someone's talking (posting?) out of their bunghole tonight.

Try again.

[The Zlax45]

Re: Regionals attendance

Someone's talking (posting?) out of their bunghole tonight.

Try again.

It is interesting that Union/PC outdrew BC/UML...you would think teams closer to the arena would support their teams better and plus conference rivals. Also, the alumni bases for UML/BC in this area are MUCH bigger than PC/Union.

[J.D.]

Re: Regionals attendance

don't underestimate the difference between playing on saturday afternoon compared to sunday evening. doesn't impact the diehards but is still a major factor.

[Fishhawk]

Re: Regionals attendance

To me though, it looked like there were more people in the stands than there were for either of the games yesterday.

Yeah just my opinion as someone who was at the game tonight and went to every game at the Tsongas but 5500 seems low. The lower bowl was very near full and that's got to be 6000. I tried to buy 3 seats together anywhere in the lowers 90 minutes before the game and was denied. Upper bowl behind the benches was also near full and behind the penalty boxes at least half full. Before reading this thread someone asked me about attendance and my guess was 9000-10000. The place has 14000 seats and even though upper balcony behind the nets was curtained off it was definitely way more than half full.

[claver2010]

Re: Regionals attendance

Bruins on national tv, and Red Sox had a game also. BC doesn't fill their barn for a home game, let alone for a road game.

no

[Greg Ambrose]

Re: Regionals attendance

don't underestimate the difference between playing on saturday afternoon compared to sunday evening. doesn't impact the diehards but is still a major factor.

I am one of those people who went Saturday but not Sunday. A Saturday night doubleheader, even given how late I got home (midnight or so) was reasonable since the next day is Sunday. The start time on Sunday was 5PM, the game really didn't start until 5:15 or so and it wasn't over until 8. If I had gone, I would have gotten home somewhere around 9:30 which, at the end of a long weekend and having to get up the next morning for work, was too late for these old bones. I'm not quite sure why the Saturday games had to be 4 & 7:30 because that necessitates the championship game starting later on Sunday. The Friday games in Bridgeport began at 2PM, why not the same for Worcester. Had they started at 2 on Saturday, the second game would have started at 5 or so, which would have meant the championship game could have been at 3.

Of course, I say all this and I am only one person. I would have to say that the main reason the attendance was medicore was the price of the tickets. Pretty hefty price for a college kid. Plus, my take over the years is that BC does not travel that well, at least not in the numbers that should have been there for both days given that Worcester is about an hour from Chestnut Hill. We'll see how it goes next year in Manchester, especially if UNH isn't in the tournament (a distinct possibility).

[theprofromdover]

Re: Regionals attendance

. BC doesn't fill their barn for a home game....

Dope. ©

[Jasma]

Re: Regionals attendance

It is interesting that Union/PC outdrew BC/UML...you would think teams closer to the arena would support their teams better and plus conference rivals. Also, the alumni bases for UML/BC in this area are MUCH bigger than PC/Union.

Check who purchased the tickets for Bridgeport. I think that you may find most of those tickets, since they sell packages and not individual games, were purchsed by Quinnipiac and UVM fans. They have larger followings than PC and Union.

Bottom line is the regional set-up needs an overhall. Cities like Worcester and Bridgeport, with small college hockey fan bases, need to be taken out of the mix, at least for awhile. Providence, Albany, Syracuse and Rochester would be better sites. They have large college hockey fan bases and have done well with NCAA events in the past.

I'm not as familiar with teh history in the mid-west, but I don't get why cities like Cincinnati keep getting the events. Pick places with built in crowds and/or great entertainment options and hotels near the arena - like Providence - with buildings that hold fewer than 15,000. If that means that sometimes you have a regional in or near a campus site like Madison, Ann Arbor, Albany, or Grand Forks, so be it. I would prefer to see a building near capacity and rocking, than less than half-full. Improve the atmosphere and build demand and then go back to larger buildings.

[CLS]

Re: Regionals attendance

...I'm not quite sure why the Saturday games had to be 4 & 7:30 ....

Two words: T and V.

[D2D]

Re: Regionals attendance

Two words: T and V.

I think T and V are letters.

[billmich88888]

Re: Regionals attendance

Tee Vee

[TUSCHWI]

Re: Regionals attendance

Bottom line is the regional set-up needs an overhall. Cities like Worcester and Bridgeport, with small college hockey fan bases, need to be taken out of the mix, at least for awhile. Providence, Albany, Syracuse and Rochester would be better sites. They have large college hockey fan bases and have done well with NCAA events in the past.

I'm not as familiar with teh history in the mid-west, but I don't get why cities like Cincinnati keep getting the events. Pick places with built in crowds and/or great entertainment options and hotels near the arena - like Providence - with buildings that hold fewer than 15,000. If that means that sometimes you have a regional in or near a campus site like Madison, Ann Arbor, Albany, or Grand Forks, so be it. I would prefer to see a building near capacity and rocking, than less than half-full. Improve the atmosphere and build demand and then go back to larger buildings.

This summarizes my feelings exactly. When I looked ahead, I saw the Cincy is on the docket for another Regional. While Cincy regional is a joke to many they actually sometimes do better than Worcester and Bridgeport. Jasma's right; dump the cities that don't do well. The crowds at some of these places are embarrassing.

And the NCAA needs to go back to Econ basics - lower prices to generate demand. From my view, in Madison, one week after the B16 tournament (which would have cost $200 ish for two seats for the event, not counting travel, hotel, food, booze, bail money, etc), then I would have had to cough up maybe more to go to Cincy with 5 days notice. It's not a lack of want, it's a lack of resources. It just isn't the good ol' days anymore when people had (or thought they had) a lot of excess money to spend.

The NC$$ in their bubble just doesn't understand the economics of the average person, including college hockey fans. If BC and UMass-Lowell only draw what they did and the regional was an hour or so away from them, then there is a problem.

[PuckLuck81]

Re: Regionals attendance

I just think we need to come to grips that the interest level in Men's college hockey is just not what it used to be. Too many other options for people now. Hockey will continue to be a regional affair and will always play 3rd fiddle to the big two - football and basketball - in terms of revenue and TV coverage. When a great hockey market like St Paul can only draw 8800 people with two local teams competing for a spot in the FF you have a problem. I agree with other posters that the NCAA needs to re-evaluate ticket prices and look to move into smaller venues to start creating a demand again.

[Meehan Popcorn Guy]

Re: Regionals attendance

This summarizes my feelings exactly. When I looked ahead, I saw the Cincy is on the docket for another Regional. While Cincy regional is a joke to many they actually sometimes do better than Worcester and Bridgeport. Jasma's right; dump the cities that don't do well. The crowds at some of these places are embarrassing.

And the NCAA needs to go back to Econ basics - lower prices to generate demand. From my view, in Madison, one week after the B16 tournament (which would have cost $200 ish for two seats for the event, not counting travel, hotel, food, booze, bail money, etc), then I would have had to cough up maybe more to go to Cincy with 5 days notice. It's not a lack of want, it's a lack of resources. It just isn't the good ol' days anymore when people had (or thought they had) a lot of excess money to spend.

The NC$$ in their bubble just don't understand the economics of the average person, including college hockey fans. If BC and UMass-Lowell only draw what they did and the regional was an hour or so away from them, then there is a problem.

This.

Unfortunately, the people who organize the tournament are apathetic.

The game times will continue to be terrible as long as ESPN is involved, because ESPN does not prioritize hockey. It would rather re-air old "30-for-30" specials about the connection between hip hop inspired tennis shirts and the advent of domed stadiums. It struck me that NCAA wrestling got a better timeslot last weekend than hockey did this weekend. I have seen cheerleading competitions in far better timeslots. Bowling routinely gets better timeslots. The spelling bee, and so on. But I think this is an example of the organizers being powerless. As much as they might like to move the event to NBC Sports, NHL Network, or someone (anyone) who actually has a cent invested in promoting the game and would air at appropriate times, hockey is probably an infinitesimal piece of a negotiation driven by football and basketball considerations and relationships between people who rarely, if ever, sat in a rink. So it is what it is. I continue to wonder what the purpose of College Hockey Inc. is if not to exert some kind of influence on these matters, but I digress.

Meanwhile, there is no excuse for continuing to hold regionals in 15,000-seat arenas when the attendance, year after year, hovers between 5-10,000. It is dead in these buildings. I have experienced it. I can feel it when I watch on TV. Some of these places don't even have decent ice. Others are hundreds of miles from the nearest team. Who keeps deciding to do this? It's sheer apathy and it's really bad for the tournament. The regionals are so anticlimactic -- is there any other sport where the energy in the building during regular season games is 100 times greater than the postseason? Where all you can hear in the regular season are students and bands and then in the postseason it's so quiet you can listen to conversations in other sections? Where season ticket holders elect not to attend playoff games within driving distance? I realize there is resistance to returning to playing best-of-three series at home sites (though that is clearly the correct thing to do from a competition standpoint as it rewards the higher seeds and best teams) but at least play the regionals in appropriately sized facilities, I mean what is so difficult about doing that?