What Do You Think Are The Biggest Factors For Attendance?

[SJHooper]

I saw this debate on a SJ forum and I find it interesting, maybe others do too. I know schools like Creighton don't have this problem and good for them. People cite lots of different reasons for this. Here are some of mine, also curious to see what others think:

Success of the program: I think this is the biggest factor is how successful the program is. If you did a correlation study you would probably get something like r=0.84 (1 being a 100% correlation). If you don't win you won't get big attendance numbers. Of course there are exceptions but this is the rule for the most part.

Venue: Believe it or not, I think the quality of the venue is the 2nd most important factor affecting attendance. We see much more fan support in MSG than we do at CA. I believe a big part of this is due to the very low quality of Carnesecca. Our fans have been begging for comfortable seats rather than bleachers, and 21st century vendors. Right now all you can buy is popcorn or a pretzel. Compare this to Binghamton and Boston U. which are lightyears ahead in this area. Even in down years they still had solid crowds. This is likely due to their great facilities...you can make a night out of going to a game and enjoying yourself. At Carnesecca your back is going to ache and you can't get any real food. It's also routinely 90 degrees in there and stagnant.

Diversity of the student population: I know this may be a more controversial one, that word is like a 3rd rail but it's interesting to explore. St. John's is a very diverse school. You can walk around campus for 10 minutes and not hear English being spoken. I'm not implying this is right or wrong, but having many different cultures in your student population makes it less likely to unify for certain events such as a basketball game. Studies show that more diversity weakens a sense of unity. Many of our undergrads are international students and many of them may not even care about college basketball. In other countries, college is for education and nothing else. We are the only country where college athletics are a huge deal. Look at schools like Creighton, Villanova, Butler, etc. pretty homogeneous student populations and they all rally around their basketball teams. Again, no one said it was a good or bad thing, just saying it's a factor.

[Bill Marsh]

I'm thinking that the most important factors are tradition, size of the university, and competition for other entertainment options within the community.

[DudeAnon]

Interesting thread. I somewhat agree with your points. But here would be my own.

1) Winning is the biggest factor. It is very hard to continually support a losing program, thats just how it is.
2) Ease of access. Xavier's arena is on campus and a 15 minute walk max for every student on campus.
3) Quality of opponents. Xavier has always had great attendance but the fact that we average a sellout now is definitely a testament to playing in The Big East.

As far as your diversity comment. While it might be a small factor negatively impacting athletics I think most schools would kill to have the international and diverse population that St. Johns does.

[BluejayBuff]

Look at schools like Creighton, Villanova, Butler, etc. pretty homogeneous student populations and they all rally around their basketball teams. Again, no one said it was a good or bad thing, just saying it's a factor.

When you say "homogeneous student populations," do you mean that they are all similar or that they all stick around after school or what? I can't speak for all of CU nation, but I can tell you firsthand that students at Creighton only show up in droves when the team is top 25, playing a good team, and/or it isn't finals week. It's a pretty common complaint amongst some Bluejay fans that CU students don't support the teams enough.

As far as CU goes, having a world-class venue that does fairly well to update technologies in the arena helps. It also helps to serve alcohol, have a moderately exclusive restaurant in the venue, and have a very large contingent of well-off alumni in the area that purchase a huge amount of season tickets. As with all arenas, season tickets are always counted as present for the attendance count. I believe the season ticket numbers are up to 15,000+. We average just over 17,000.

[SJHooper]

Interesting thread. I somewhat agree with your points. But here would be my own.

1) Winning is the biggest factor. It is very hard to continually support a losing program, thats just how it is.
2) Ease of access. Xavier's arena is on campus and a 15 minute walk max for every student on campus.
3) Quality of opponents. Xavier has always had great attendance but the fact that we average a sellout now is definitely a testament to playing in The Big East.

As far as your diversity comment. While it might be a small factor negatively impacting athletics I think most schools would kill to have the international and diverse population that St. Johns does.

Agreed on the first one. After a long time losing, it begins to become the fabric of the program and fans pick up on this. As an undergrad at Marist (went to SJ for my M.S.) we used to pack the house to watch the women's basketball team and ignore the men's games. Why? The women were consistently ranked and even went to the sweet 16. They had a long history of winning. Our men's team had maybe 1 decent year in the last 20. They have been one of the worst in division 1 other than their NIT year in 2007.

Ease of access is also probably another reason so many more fans flock to MSG other than the comfort. For me, I just hop on the LIRR and it takes you directly to Penn Station which is connected to MSG. You literally walk upstairs once you get in the station. It's only about an hour ride so you have time to enjoy a few beers or coffee on the way. Nice not having to deal with traffic. Driving through Queens is a nightmare no matter what time of day it is, so the SJ fans who are not living on campus going to Carnesecca basically have to drive. An hour driving through Queens vs. an hour relaxing on a train listening to music and drinking are very different!

Quality of opponents is definitely another...the SJ fanbase was out in full force in 2011 at MSG when we beat #4 Pitt. We were good and we were playing a top 5 team. Plus it was at MSG. All those factors equal a packed house. Just goes to show the fans are out there, they just need a reason to go and a comfortable venue with easy access regarding transportation.

As per the diversity comment, I don't think there's any question it negatively affects school pride and attendance. The question is how much. It's great to be able to boast an international presence, however within our diverse student body, many come from low income areas and are the first to attend college in their family. Many receive Pell grants which I believe are given to us by the government to attract students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds. This is our lifeblood and we rely on those grants. The flipside is that academically we suffer because of it. This is why whenever you see the Big East academics rankings, we will always be at the bottom. Our university is more focused on attracting those populations to get as much grant money as possible as opposed to seeking the most qualified students. As I've said before, SJ is very easy to get into as an undergrad, but our graduate programs are very competitive.

[Hall2012]

On a game by game basis, I think the biggest factor is quality of opponent. Even in a down year, Seton Hall usually has no problem drawing a good crowd when a top 10 team or brand name school comes to down. On the other hand, in a year coming off a Big East Championship, they can't half fill a banner raising against CCSU. Seton Hall fans constantly gripe (and for good reason about non-conference schedules) and while the Hall certainly played some quality opponents this year, none of those games were at the Rock.

On a full season basis, the overall averages are certainly up when the team is winning, but it's still subject to fluctuations based on opponent. The Villanova game this year is looking like it'll break SHU's attendance record at the Prudential Center, meanwhile the DePaul game is likely to be half empty as it always is. I think it's especially true in the market that SHU and SJU find themselves in that the team being good isn't enough to sell out. There's more competition for the sports/entertainment dollar here than anywhere else in the world. Without looking, I'd bet that we also have some of the higher ticket prices in the league despite not being the best teams (I used to work for SHU athletics and remember hearing when I was there that the average Creighton season ticket cost less than half of ours). Basically, with so many options, the whole product needs to be good to draw here, and the home team is only half the product.

I'll add one more point, which is ease of access, especially for students. At Seton Hall, students will turn up for the big games, but less so for the average ones and not at all for the lesser ones. I think this has to do a lot with not having an on campus arena. It means that unlike a lot of schools, we have to charge students for tickets. They also have to hop a bus (the school does provide shuttles) into Newark to see the game instead of just walking across campus. Some games just aren't worth that kind of effort. The one plus to the off campus arena is the ability to serve alcohol.

[SJHooper]

Look at schools like Creighton, Villanova, Butler, etc. pretty homogeneous student populations and they all rally around their basketball teams. Again, no one said it was a good or bad thing, just saying it's a factor.

When you say "homogeneous student populations," do you mean that they are all similar or that they all stick around after school or what? I can't speak for all of CU nation, but I can tell you firsthand that students at Creighton only show up in droves when the team is top 25, playing a good team, and/or it isn't finals week. It's a pretty common complaint amongst some Bluejay fans that CU students don't support the teams enough.

As far as CU goes, having a world-class venue that does fairly well to update technologies in the arena helps. It also helps to serve alcohol, have a moderately exclusive restaurant in the venue, and have a very large contingent of well-off alumni in the area that purchase a huge amount of season tickets. As with all arenas, season tickets are always counted as present for the attendance count. I believe the season ticket numbers are up to 15,000+. We average just over 17,000.

When I say homogeneous I mean Creighton is presumably 80%+ white students who were born here, have parents who were born here, grandparents who were born here, and have pretty common backgrounds mostly centered in the midwest. PC is the same but more focused in the northeast. I know I felt more connected to Marist (which had a student body much more similar to where I grew up) than St. John's in terms of school culture. Everyone has their preferences and I'm not one to judge either way, but my point is that there are communication, values, and cultural breakdowns when your student body is very diverse. Growing up in this country, college basketball is a big deal if you go to a big name basketball school. The less assimilated you are, the less likely you are to embrace college hoops IMO. From my experiences as well (again not all, don't want to stereotype) but strictly anecdotal, the international students seem more focused on their academics and then going home. They don't seem to "stick around" as much for basketball games so I guess that's part of what I was trying to say bluejaybuff.

[BluejayBuff]

When I say homogeneous I mean Creighton is presumably 80%+ white students who were born here, have parents who were born here, grandparents who were born here, and have pretty common backgrounds mostly centered in the midwest. PC is the same but more focused in the northeast. I know I felt more connected to Marist (which had a student body much more similar to where I grew up) than St. John's in terms of school culture. Everyone has their preferences and I'm not one to judge either way, but my point is that there are communication, values, and cultural breakdowns when your student body is very diverse. Growing up in this country, college basketball is a big deal if you go to a big name basketball school. The less assimilated you are, the less likely you are to embrace college hoops IMO. From my experiences as well (again not all, don't want to stereotype) but strictly anecdotal, the international students seem more focused on their academics and then going home. They don't seem to "stick around" as much for basketball games so I guess that's part of what I was trying to say bluejaybuff.

Gotcha - thanks for clarifying.

For the record, CU is 72-74% white, depending on the year.

[DudeAnon]

As per the diversity comment, I don't think there's any question it negatively affects school pride and attendance. The question is how much. It's great to be able to boast an international presence, however within our diverse student body, many come from low income areas and are the first to attend college in their family. Many receive Pell grants which I believe are given to us by the government to attract students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds. This is our lifeblood and we rely on those grants. The flipside is that academically we suffer because of it. This is why whenever you see the Big East academics rankings, we will always be at the bottom. Our university is more focused on attracting those populations to get as much grant money as possible as opposed to seeking the most qualified students. As I've said before, SJ is very easy to get into as an undergrad, but our graduate programs are very competitive.

I think you are being overly negative on having a diverse (racially, economically etc.) student population. A lot of people are proud to be a part of a diverse student body. So don't get me wrong, SJU's cultural makeup might hurt basketball attendance but many would argue that is a small trade-off.

Also, Pell grants (which I received) aren't given by the school but rather by the government and every single school in america accepts them, so I don't know why you single SJU out. And they have nothing to do with admission standards, its purely based on economic means.

[SJHooper]

When I say homogeneous I mean Creighton is presumably 80%+ white students who were born here, have parents who were born here, grandparents who were born here, and have pretty common backgrounds mostly centered in the midwest. PC is the same but more focused in the northeast. I know I felt more connected to Marist (which had a student body much more similar to where I grew up) than St. John's in terms of school culture. Everyone has their preferences and I'm not one to judge either way, but my point is that there are communication, values, and cultural breakdowns when your student body is very diverse. Growing up in this country, college basketball is a big deal if you go to a big name basketball school. The less assimilated you are, the less likely you are to embrace college hoops IMO. From my experiences as well (again not all, don't want to stereotype) but strictly anecdotal, the international students seem more focused on their academics and then going home. They don't seem to "stick around" as much for basketball games so I guess that's part of what I was trying to say bluejaybuff.

Gotcha - thanks for clarifying.

For the record, CU is 72-74% white, depending on the year.

Thanks for yours as well...this is our breakdown:

0.2% American Indian/Alaskan Native
14.8% Asian
14.8% Black/African-American
13.6% Hispanic/Latino
4.1% Multi-race (not Hispanic/Latino)
0.4% Native Hawaiian/ Pacific Islander
42.8% White
9.3% Unknown

When 10% are "unknown" you know it's truly diverse I should have done this study while in grad school. I also think it's funny that in our commercial that airs during games on FS1, they don't show one white male student. That speaks volumes regarding what populations we are trying to attract if you can read between the lines...might be unintentional like a Freudian slip of sorts, but when marketing a big university I'm sure some planning went into it. I know some of this stuff is uncomfortable, but it's very interesting. I'm a psychologist after all so I'm always looking for reasons why things happen/don't happen!