Re: Fire Mike Eaves?
It is odd that there is such a drop off. I guess hockey is becoming less and less of an interest of people on campus and the area?
"On campus" and "in the area" are both isssues, but entirely different issues. As a current student, I can say much more about the "on campus" part, though as students graduate, it directly affects the non-student fan base. Hockey seems to be promoted as a footnote compared to the all-powerful football that doesn't have attendance problems...but it's FOOTBALL! (If you can't tell, I'm saying that snarkily.) The students who do show up are still what you've heard about the Wisconsin student section, but they're just less numerous. If a basketball game happens to be
very, very close, then the student section there can match a hockey student section from the first 5 minutes last night (having every reason to feel "flat"). Random people don't know very much about college hockey, while plenty of other fans know a ton about it, because they seeked out the information themselves. (The amount of college hockey knowledge among student fans would absolutely bewilder the more arrogant Gopher fans.) Once fans get exposed, they pretty much always like it. Personally, I don't understand how you can identify as a sports fan, be a current student, and not want to go to hockey games. My buddies and I struggle to get chants going at basketball games. At hockey games, I can yell some amusing observation about the opponent in chant form, and everyone keeps it going. It's amazing how much the hockey student section has shrunk, while still easily being the best student section we have.
They've started reaching out more after just saying "hey, you can buy hockey season tickets" in previous years. Obviously, there's no magic button they can press to fill the arena, so I give them credit for showing they care a little.
As for in the area, I'm not exposed to the same news and coverage other locals are. If local media covered it a lot more, I think more people would see it as one of our marquee sports, rather than the most popular of the "other" sports. As I said in the Wisconsin season thread, a "Rumpel Out for the Weekend" article or some LSSU series preview on the front of the Wisconsin State Journal's sports page would make a huge difference. You don't promote hockey by saying the goalie is injured, but by getting that news fed to you rather than seeking it out, it changes your mindset. I wish I had a better of idea of where Badger hockey stands in the minds of the locals, and how it compares to 5, 10, and 20 years ago.
What I find most bizarre is the sheer amount of hockey apparel I see on people around campus compared to other sports doesn't seem to translate into student season ticket sales. It's possible that there are hockey fans who simply aren't becoming Badger hockey fans, writing it off as an "extra" sport, not knowing it's pretty relevant to the sport as a whole, just like NCAA football is. Tons of students, who may be NHL fans, come from places where college hockey is an unknown, but if they're American, college football and basketball have been beaten into their minds. They know what they're getting with basketball and football. They need to be
introduced to college hockey. That's the challenge.
Let me tell you this - hockey is popular here. There's something more at play. People who used to go to more games but don't anymore most likely didn't just lose their interest in hockey. I don't know of any sports fans who just stop watching a sport like that. With diminished TV coverage, they may have lost touch with the Badgers, but I doubt they stopped caring about hockey at all. (But seriously, get the freakin' games on TV.) When I walked into Dick's Sporting Goods in Madison, I was amazed at the hockey section. Lots of equipment, and they even had a fairly wide selection of skates! The only place you can get that where I'm from is at pro shops. Our sporting goods stores have a small selection of street and ice hockey sticks, but not all the equipment they had up here. No, I'm not from Louisiana. I'm from the immediate DC suburbs, where the Capitals are as popular as ever, and there are quite a few nearby ice rinks (3 near me on my side of the river) with plenty of hockey being played. Tons of people playing hockey at local parks in the winter is something I could have only dreamed of, but it's reality here in Madison.
