Who has the best fanbase?

[FenwayFriar]

It's simple mathematics. SJ has at least DOUBLE the student population and thus, alumni. Do celebrities regularly attend SHU games? Didn't think so. Have you guys been prominent in any ESPN docs? Didn't think so. Hate to break it to you, but Seton Hall has a mid major level fanbase. You can have New Jersey from whatever Rutgers left over. We are NEW YORK's team. NYC and its major suburb of LI. As someone else said, you can observe how many SJ fans there are on various forums vs. SHU fans. It's probably 3:1. I know SHU has had a solid run and SJ has been down for the most part, but when it comes to fanbases, it's not even a debate. SJ is the way bigger brand with a much bigger following. Even when SHU was ranked and SJ was bottom half Big East, we were getting more headlines. That's not by accident.

If you're going by who has the most fans why don't you just rank your list based on total student enrollment? This thread is called BEST fanbase, right? With that being said, not sure why people aren't including UConn on the list. They're part of the league now, whether good 'ole gtmo wants to believe it or not.

(1) Creighton
(2) Villanova
(3) Xavier
(4) Providence
(5) St. John's
(6) UConn
(7) Marquette
(8) Butler
(9) Seton Hall
(10) Georgetown
(11) DePaul

[Hall2012]

Yeah I get that, if I were a Hall fan I'd argue a lot with MM. I don't really agree with the bumper sticker stuff or which fan base has more celebrity fans (definitely the first time I've seen that argued lol).

That said, I do feel Hall should have better fan support given how successful you have been these past 5 years. I'm surprised battles with Nova don't sell out (16K for this year- decent but should be higher). I think the problem is you guys didn't really get many new fans during the period from 2001-2015. Those students didn't have much to cheer for, and unlike St. John's you have a much smaller alumni size. Hopefully the Michigan St game comes close to selling out. The school has to find a way to sell out those type of games, even if some tickets go for really cheap. Cragg (St. John's new AD) was one reason for our increased MSG attendance this year.

They could probably immediately increase their season ticket holder base by offering cheaper tickets upstairs (they apparently sold out the "cheap" section across from the students in season tickets). The problem is that opening the top increases the rent they need to pay just to open the doors for that game, so they don't want to do so for games that they know won't draw well, there's no option of just moving those games on campus, Walsh is too small. So as a result they keep their season ticket holders in the lower bowl (while pricing out many young alums) and only open the top for games that sell out the lower bowl like 2 months in advance

[Fieldhouse Flyer]

If you're going by who has the most fans why don't you just rank your list based on total student enrollment? This thread is called BEST fanbase, right?

I don’t have a dog in this race, but here are the latest numbers from my Big East database:

2018-19 Average Home Attendance

Creighton - 15, 980
Marquette - 15,821
Xavier - 10,034

Providence – 9,542
St. John's – 9,193
Villanova – 9,053
UConn – 8,652
Seton Hall – 8,507
Butler – 8,419
Georgetown – 7,212

DePaul – 3,847

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Big East Institutions - Sorted in Order of Enrolment (Information from Wikipedia ‘conference’ articles.)

Total Enrolment • Institution • Founded • Type • Endowment

32,257 • University of Connecticut • 1881 • Public • $0.447 billion

23,799 • DePaul University • 1898 • Catholic (Vincentian) • $0.596 billion
20,448 • St. John's University • 1870 • Catholic (Vincentian) • $0.648 billion

17,858 • Georgetown University • 1789 • Catholic (Jesuit) • $1.770 billion
11,745 • Marquette University • 1881 • Catholic (Jesuit) • $0.550 billion
10,735 • Villanova University • 1842 • Catholic (Augustinian) • $0.715 billion

9,627 • Seton Hall University • 1856 • Catholic (Diocesan) • $0.243 billion
8,236 • Creighton University • 1878 • Catholic (Jesuit) • $0.448 billion
6,538 • Xavier University • 1831 • Catholic (Jesuit) • $0.151 billion

4,848 • Butler University • 1855 • Private (Christian) • $0.174 billion
4,533 • Providence College • 1917 • Catholic (Dominican) • $0.213 billion

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The Princeton Review College Rankings 2019 Homepage – 62 Lists - The Princeton Review, August 2018

Extracurriculars – 10 “Top 20 Schools” List

• Students Pack the Stadiums - The Princeton Review, August 2018

#1 Syracuse University • Syracuse, NY • 15,226 undergraduates enrolled
#2 Clemson University • Clemson, SC • 19,669 undergraduates enrolled
#3 Xavier University (OH) • Cincinnati, OH • 4,997 undergraduates enrolled

#7 Marquette University • Milwaukee, WI • 8,435 undergraduates enrolled
#8 University of Connecticut • Storrs, CT • 19,324 undergraduates enrolled
#9 Providence College • Providence, RI • 4,306 undergraduates enrolled
#16 St. John's University • New York, NY • 16,884 undergraduates enrolled

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Biggest University in the Expanded Big East Conference: The University of Connecticut

Biggest Average Home Attendance in the Expanded Big East Conference: Creighton University

Biggest Reputation in The Princeton Review Survey: Xavier University
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Who has the best fanbase?

I am curious how we would rank teams based on their fanbase (attendance, passion etc.)

BTW, asking a quantitative question without adequately defining the evaluation criteria is far from clever. Your question, as asked, cannot be answered.

[jbarajas0490]

So DePaul is the biggest school but has the worst team. Lol wow.

[Wizard of Westroads]

Posted on another thread, seems appropriate here. Twitter followers for men's bb Twitter accounts:

Villanova 197K
Uconn 87.3K
Creighton 71.9K
Butler 67K
Xavier 41.4K
SJU 30.7K
Marquette 28.7K
Georgetown 24.1K
Seton Hall 17.7K
Providence 13K
DePaul 10.7K

Nova's gotten a lot of juice nationally from the 2 titles. Creighton's followers are with a team that hasn't made the SS since 1974.

[Fieldhouse Flyer]

Wizard - I was thinking the same thing, but you beat me to the punch and posted while I was typing. Here is a bit more detail:

[poll]Which Big East team are you a fan of? – admin - June 26, 2019

Twitter men's basketball followers of each school. Apparently DePaul only has women's bb, so I used their athletics account figure.

Villanova 197K
UConn 87.3K
Creighton 71.9K
Butler 67K
Xavier 41.4K
SJU 30.7K
Marquette 28.7K
Georgetown 24.1K
Seton Hall 17.7K
Providence 13K
DePaul 10.7K

Other noteworthy figures:

Stephen Curry 13.5M
Duke 2.2M
New York Knicks 2.1M
St. Louis 16.7K
Dayton 55K
VCU 19K

kayako – thank you very much for taking the time to research and post this interesting information, which I have added to my Big East database. Until I read your post, it had not occurred to me that the number of twitter followers is a valid proxy indicator of college basketball fandom.

In order to provide another useful context for the numbers you posted, I’ll divide the number of twitter followers by each school’s undergraduate enrolment to obtain ratios. I chose undergraduate enrolment instead of total enrolment because alumni who are also college sports fans tend to be a fan of their undergraduate institution, rather than school(s) where they continued their post-graduate education.

The undergraduate enrolment figures shown below were mined from the 2019 edition of The Princeton Review’s Best 384 Colleges, with the exception of Virginia Commonwealth University. It is interesting that all 11 Big East schools and 13 out of 14 Atlantic 10 schools are listed in The Princeton Review’s Best 384 Colleges, but VCU didn’t make the cut so I’ll use the data from the Niche Rankings: #352 Virginia Commonwealth University – undergraduate enrolment: 20,036.
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Schools Sorted in order of Undergraduate Enrolment

Institution • Undergraduate Enrolment • No. of Twitter Followers

Virginia Commonwealth U. • 20,036 • 19,000
University of Connecticut • 19,324 • 87,300
St. John's University • 16,884 • 30,700
DePaul University • 14,507 • 10,700

University of Dayton • 8,617 • 55,000
Marquette University • 8,435 • 28,700
Georgetown University • 7,459 • 24,100
Saint Louis University • 7,167 • 16,700
Villanova University • 6,966 • 197,000
Seton Hall University • 5,497 • 17,700

Xavier University • 4,997 • 41,400
Butler University • 4,698 • 67,000
Creighton University • 4,446 • 71,900
Providence College • 4,306 • 13,000

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Schools Sorted in order of RATIO: (Twitter Followers) / (Undergraduate Enrolment)

RATIO: (Twitter Followers) / (Undergraduate Enrolment) • Institution • Undergraduate Enrolment • No. of Twitter Followers

28.3 • Villanova University • 6,966 • 197,000
16.2 • Creighton University • 4,446 • 71,900
14.3 • Butler University • 4,698 • 67,000

8.3 • Xavier University • 4,997 • 41,400
6.4 • University of Dayton • 8,617 • 55,000

4.5 • University of Connecticut • 19,324 • 87,300
3.4 • Marquette University • 8,435 • 28,700
3.2 • Georgetown University • 7,459 • 24,100
3.2 • Seton Hall University • 5,497 • 17,700
3.0 • Providence College • 4,306 • 13,000
2.3 • Saint Louis University • 7,167 • 16,700

1.8 • St. John's University • 16,884 • 30,700
0.9 • Virginia Commonwealth U. • 20,036 • 19,000
0.7 • DePaul University • 14,507 • 10,700

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Villanova University, with an extremely impressive ratio of 28.3 (i.e. 197,000 twitter followers/6,966 undergraduates).

[Fieldhouse Flyer]

Schools Sorted in order of RATIO: (Average home attendance) / (Undergraduate Enrolment)

RATIO: (Average home attendance) / (Undergraduate Enrolment) • Institution • Undergraduate Enrolment • Average home attendance

3.59 • Creighton University • 4,446 • 15,980

2.22 • Providence College • 4,306 • 9,542
2.01 • Xavier University • 4,997 • 10,034

1.88 • Marquette University • 8,435 • 15,821
1.79 • Butler University • 4,698 • 8,419
1.55 • Seton Hall University • 5,497 • 8,507
1.50 • University of Dayton • 8,617 • 12,941
1.30 • Villanova University • 6,966 • 9,053

0.97 • Georgetown University • 7,459 • 7,212
0.96 • Saint Louis University • 7,167 • 6,890

0.54 • St. John's University • 16,884 • 9,193
0.45 • University of Connecticut • 19,324 • 8,652
0.38 • Virginia Commonwealth U. • 20,036 • 7,637
0.27 • DePaul University • 14,507 • 3,847

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Creighton University, with a ratio of 3.59 (i.e. 15,980 average attendance/4,446 undergraduates).

[kayako]

kayako – thank you very much for taking the time to research and post this interesting information, which I have added to my Big East database. Until I read your post, it had not occurred to me that the number of twitter followers is a valid proxy indicator of college basketball fandom.

I wouldn't call it research, but you should check out Adoraz' instagram numbers as well. It feels a little more realistic with less variables.

[kmacker69]

Best fan-base is about as subjective as it gets... Ask who has the most in numbers, fanatical, supportive, knowledgeable, Fickle, and ignorant and at least you have something to zero in on. VU, CU, VU, BU, GT, XU... (Had to at least throw a barb Xs way on that one)

[Hall2012]

Best fan-base is about as subjective as it gets... Ask who has the most in numbers, fanatical, supportive, knowledgeable, Fickle, and ignorant and at least you have something to zero in on. VU, CU, VU, BU, GT, XU... (Had to at least throw a barb Xs way on that on)

Yeah, this. I honestly thought it was a troll thread at first.