SEC students not going to lousy non conference games shocker!

[dublinirish]

College Football: Declining Student Attendance Hits Georgia - WSJ.com

probably the worst article WSJ has ever posted, and that is saying something. Dear God.

 

[DillonHall]

I'm not sure why you posted it if you thought it was so bad.

I actually found the article to be a worthwhile skim; it had some interesting stats.

 

[Voltaire]

In fairness, the article also said that the student section has never exceeded 15,000 of the 18,000 allotted seats from 2009 to 2012, which I presume would include SEC games. I think this is interesting in the context of the conversation about Notre Dame having a quiet stadium. I always thought that would affect the gameday experience of players and/or visiting recruits at Notre Dame as compared to other college stadiums, but in light of this article perhaps not as much as I thought.

 

[Ndaccountant]

In fairness, the article also said that the student section has never exceeded 15,000 of the 18,000 allotted seats from 2009 to 2012, which I presume would include SEC games. I think this is interesting in the context of the conversation about Notre Dame having a quiet stadium. I always thought that would affect the gameday experience of players and/or visiting recruits at Notre Dame as compared to other college stadiums, but in light of this article perhaps not as much as I thought.

stadium design and ratio of rabid fans to shiraz tailgaters is quite different in the south than to ND.

 

[Emcee77]

College Football: Declining Student Attendance Hits Georgia - WSJ.com

probably the worst article WSJ has ever posted, and that is saying something. Dear God.

What is so bad about the article? Genuinely curious what you found objectionable. I thought it was kind of interesting.

 

[Cackalacky]

All of that orange and fireworks and atmosphere are not students. Not even close.

Its 70,000 of these guys:

 

[GowerND11]

All of that orange and fireworks and atmosphere are not students. Not even close.

Its 70,000 of these guys:

Exactly. The problem at Notre Dame is that it is, generally, ONLY the students making noise. It's one thing for the students to lead the cheering and chants, it's another when they are the only ones participating.

 

[JD Irish]

Love the slight against the younger generation's shorter attention span. Wonder if they would care to study the average length of time it takes from the scheduled kickoff of a game to 0:00 in the fourth quarter today compared to twenty years ago. Could it possibly be a rational market reaction to unacceptable commercial and other break time allotments? 4+ hours for a game in which the actual action lasts only 15 minutes is a long time, especially when you're standing up and in an extremely uncomfortable, confined space.

 

[dublinirish]

the bit about young people's attention spans was just really dumb.
also its quite obvious Georgia fans wouldnt bother going to see them play NT but would go see them play LSU...no **** sherlock!

 

[ND NYC]

main reasons as i see it would be:

Flat screen high def TVs at home
No beer sold in the stadiums
Too hungover to head out to the games
never make it from tailgate to stadium

 

[RDU Irish]

Nowhere does it mention prices. If, like ND, they are paying something like half price for their tickets and student IDs are linked to prevent re-sale - they are looking at maybe $300 for season tickets for maybe two home games that are any good. That buys a lot of beer.

We also have very little competition on game day. No campus town or frat row lined with party after party and big screen after big screen.

So maybe ND has done a better job of preserving the game day experience than we give them credit for?

At the end of the day though, it is freaking pathetic these "football" schools can't get half to 1/3rd of their student body to show up for home games.

 

[Emcee77]

Nowhere does it mention prices. If, like ND, they are paying something like half price for their tickets and student IDs are linked to prevent re-sale - they are looking at maybe $300 for season tickets for maybe two home games that are any good. That buys a lot of beer.

We also have very little competition on game day. No campus town or frat row lined with party after party and big screen after big screen.

So maybe ND has done a better job of preserving the game day experience than we give them credit for?

At the end of the day though, it is freaking pathetic these "football" schools can't get half to 1/3rd of their student body to show up for home games.

A huge difference between ND and these SEC schools is that, at ND, EVERY student who wants season tickets can get them. Georgia, for instance, has more than 30,000 students, and only 15,000 tickets allotted for students; half the students can't go to the game even if they want to. That means that if you don't go to the game, you have something to do; half your friends are watching it on TV somewhere.

That's not the case at ND. When I was a student at ND, it never occurred to me not to go to a football game because literally all of my friends were at the game. I occasionally heard about people who would skip the game, but these were generally people from India or somewhere who just couldn't give a **** about football (and really, even most international students I knew typically got into football while they were at ND). If I were to skip a football game, I would be by myself during that time, so I never did skip a game. But if I knew someone who was having a huge party at his house during the game, then that might have been a different story. I mean, not for me personally; I'm just saying that as long as all ND students go to the games, all ND students will go to the games, if you catch my drift.

 

[RDU Irish]

Great points on ALL ND students getting tickets. Your conjecture on Georgia does not match what the article says though. They say 18,000 tickets, which is about half their enrollment. However, sooo many tickets go unused that I can't imagine you can't go to the game if you didn't win the ticket lottery? It also doesn't say anything about if there is a student ticket lottery or not and if such a lottery is over/under subscribed

So, yes, I find the article intriguing.

 

[RDU Irish]

Like you say, since a minimum of half the students aren't going to the game due to ticket limits, you create fertile ground for competing entertainment. Basic econ. Marginal consumption of a good is significantly influenced by substitutes. I will go to a few games but substitute parties for other games to maximize my utility. At ND, there really is no substitute.

 

[dshans]

Well, in my years at ND I didn't attend every home game. My sophomore year I skipped a USC game to tend to other business. My Junior year I went to only the Miami game (the Hurricanes were pathetic that year). My Senior year I went to no games.

Of course, back in my day every student was given a ticket as part of Student Fees. The common practice was to sell the ticket (with use of student ID) to someone who had a buddy/girlfriend/family member coming to town for the game. I recall that I asked a reasonable 5 bucks and always got my ID back. These were simpler, hippie days. My senior year a house mate had his girlfriend visiting every weekend. In spite of my blonde hair being longer than her dark hair, Carol never had a problem with my student ID with the name "Richard."

She cooked and cleaned – she was a Home Economics major at some college nearby – when she was in town. I didn't bother charging my "housie."

My seat was never empty, but I think that the Miami game I attended had a lotta extra butt space in the stands. I think that it was counted as a sellout, but that had to do with ticket sales, not bodies.