Demand is governed by cost. Lower tickets to draw in students, who create a culture of following the teams on weekends. Price them out of going, and they're not going to suddenly decide in March to fork over 100 bucs. It's an amazing mismatch between the customers they want to get money from (rich corporations, rich alumni) and the lifeblood of a college team (college students).
Basic marginal pricing tells corps how much a particular event yields. Looking short term tells you 100 ticks at $40 is better than 195 ticks at $20. Of course, having a longer term vision tells you 195 ticks are better, because you double the fan base, mostly the youth market.
But when you have teams like UNH trying to milk every last dollar once the team became popular, you priced the youth out of the market.
Not only does targetting the wrong market show a lack of a long term vision, but also the lack of actual enthusiam in the crowd.
Thankfully, hitting rock bottom causes the marketing plan to die, returning back to the proper model.
