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Attendance at Regionals

Re: Attendance at Regionals

matt said:
I think the OP wanted this week to be the off week. That wouldn't work, as it would put hockey on the schedule for next week, and the whole idea from the NCAA is to have next week all for basketball.
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Although next week, there would be fewer basketball games for the Hockey games to go up against.... (not that anyone watches hockey anyway outside of our niche group)...

It could possibly help with travel and thus attendance for the regionals... not sure how much. I would certainly be more likely to travel with 12 days notice rather than 5.
 
Re: Attendance at Regionals

Manchester 8049, 8357
Providence 6253, 5007
Grand Rapids 2289, 1918
Toledo 2988, 2460
 
Re: Attendance at Regionals

When I mocked Toledo being a site last year, somebody told me that it was a great choice because it was a great central location to most CCHA teams. So they get Miami and Notre Dame in Toledo...and? What a debacle.
 
Re: Attendance at Regionals

Totals:
Manchester 16406
Providence 11260
Toledo 5448
Grand Rapids 4207

37721 for the weekend.

ETA: 74% of the attendance for the regionals was in either Manchester or Providence.
 
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Re: Attendance at Regionals

brassbonanza said:
Try again, UND and Minnesota played in the regional final at the X last year and they sold under 11K. Was there not enough time for those throngs of Gopher fans to figure out how to travel to St. Paul?
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Some points to be made about a St Paul regional:

It's right after the F5 (now defunct, which might change things in the future), which is THE tourney the locals/etc go to. Vacation days are spent, MUCH money is spent, and two weekends in a row like that hurt the pocketbook. And there's no way the F5 would take a back seat to the regionals around here.

The pricing is fine, IMO, if it is in St Paul. It's about the same/slightly higher than the F5 tickets. However, see the above point.

Add to that the people who go to the F4, that's 3 weekends in a month's time that you are going to spend a crapload of money, and your team may not even be there.


As mentioned, the F5 is no more. As for the MN fans that are on GPL/here, it's up in the air whether we make the Minnesota Cup or the B1G Mistake tourney "the" tailgate/hockey weekend. If it's the MN Cup, there's a much greater chance people would go to the regional. Enough time in between those long weekends, and we can blow those wads of cash for them.
 
Re: Attendance at Regionals

Brenthoven said:
Some points to be made about a St Paul regional:

It's right after the F5 (now defunct, which might change things in the future), which is THE tourney the locals/etc go to. Vacation days are spent, MUCH money is spent, and two weekends in a row like that hurt the pocketbook. And there's no way the F5 would take a back seat to the regionals around here.

The pricing is fine, IMO, if it is in St Paul. It's about the same/slightly higher than the F5 tickets. However, see the above point.

Add to that the people who go to the F4, that's 3 weekends in a month's time that you are going to spend a crapload of money, and your team may not even be there.


As mentioned, the F5 is no more. As for the MN fans that are on GPL/here, it's up in the air whether we make the Minnesota Cup or the B1G Mistake tourney "the" tailgate/hockey weekend. If it's the MN Cup, there's a much greater chance people would go to the regional. Enough time in between those long weekends, and we can blow those wads of cash for them.
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Yet with all that, last year's St Paul regional outdraw Manchester 2013 by 25%. And the 2-day total (21k) was comparable to the COMBINED total this year of Providence PLUS Toledo AND Grand Rapids.

Time to make St Paul a "permanent" host.
 
Re: Attendance at Regionals

I'm not sure making St. Paul a permanent host would go over well (not just on here). And don't forget that it was aided by North Dakota also being there and meeting the Gophers in the regional final.
 
Re: Attendance at Regionals

J.D. said:
I'm not sure making St. Paul a permanent host would go over well (not just on here). And don't forget that it was aided by North Dakota also being there and meeting the Gophers in the regional final.
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Sure but in 2010, the St Paul regional drew around 14k (combined 2-day) without either UND or Minnesota. Still miles ahead of anything else in the West or Mideast.
 
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Re: Attendance at Regionals

Farce Poobah said:
Yet with all that, last year's St Paul regional outdraw Manchester 2013 by 25%. And the 2-day total (21k) was comparable to the COMBINED total this year of Providence PLUS Toledo AND Grand Rapids.

Time to make St Paul a "permanent" host.
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I would hope a regional in a large metropolitan area you can get a flight to from anywhere with two enormous local fanbases of historic powerhouses would outdraw two teams, one of whom wants their coach fired every five minutes, and the other whose program was nearly axed a few years ago, in a smaller arena that's more difficult to get to, with no easy flights, etc. That'd be like saying, oh, the region with BC and Maine at the TD Garden outdrew Grand Rapids? Best regional EVAR, hold it there every year!

Begs the question, why not just hold it there?
 
Re: Attendance at Regionals

Farce Poobah said:
Yet with all that, last year's St Paul regional outdraw Manchester 2013 by 25%. And the 2-day total (21k) was comparable to the COMBINED total this year of Providence PLUS Toledo AND Grand Rapids.

Time to make St Paul a "permanent" host.
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Might not be a bad idea... particularly with the F5 going away. If not St Paul, I think they need to come up with a "destination weekend" dynamic out West.

So long as they continue to "tweak" the brackets with attendance in mind, I think the Eastern regionals will pretty much be fine. So long as there are one or two of a handful of schools at each East site playing within a couple of hours from home, I think you will see these arenas drawing reasonably. (I'd guess Providence would have been closer to the Manchester numbers had it not been Easter weekend or the game had not been at 9:00).
 
Re: Attendance at Regionals

Fair enough. I'm torn because you can't argue with those numbers, but I also don't like these regionals being played in NHL arenas. Sure, the two day total is great, but is it a great atmosphere with all those empty seats?
 
Re: Attendance at Regionals

From Alex Faust
The last year of the 2-regional, 12-team format drew 36,314 total fans. This year, the 16-team, 4-regional total was 37,321
There is no West/East divide if you look at the 11-year averages in the 16-team format. E/NE average 6,530, W/MW average 6,496 since 2003.
Attendance is volatile year-to-year depending on teams in local markets, but on average, reg attendance has dropped 4% per year since '03
 
Re: Attendance at Regionals

I remember looking those numbers up last year...I was disappointed in what I found ;)

Was hoping the attendance wouldn't be as high as the old format. So they are charging ridiculous ticket prices and still getting more people. They don't care about the atmosphere at these things. That's why it sucks.
 
Re: Attendance at Regionals

80Miracle said:
...Might be time to have two eight team Regionals (example St Paul and Boston)
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Forget Boston. There's no way that they're going to give up two consecutive weekends near the end of the NHL season for college hockey. They can't even put in a competitive bid for the FF, let alone regionals. And it's not really necessary in the east anyway. Put together a way of scheduling a super regional in St. Paul and you might have something.
 
Re: Attendance at Regionals

CLS said:
Forget Boston. There's no way that they're going to give up two consecutive weekends near the end of the NHL season for college hockey. They can't even put in a competitive bid for the FF, let alone regionals. And it's not really necessary in the east anyway. Put together a way of scheduling a super regional in St. Paul and you might have something.
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With the new conferences, Denver/St Paul for the west. Both are mainly central, good cities to have hockey in, etc.
 
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