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I'm back for my 2nd post.We are all entitled to our opinions.I don't feel I was "schooled" as someone said.I am trying to promote some discussion during this lull before the season starts.Why don't the home games sell out?During the Spoonball era crowds at Scottrade reached 20,000.The team this year was just as succesful,going to the 2nd round of the NCAA Tournament yet an average attendence of only 7700 in a great on campus facility.This was even baffling to RM as he seemed at a loss as to why no sell-outs at the end of the regular season.One reason in my opinion is the upper deck ticket prices are way too high.Your thoughts?

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I'm back for my 2nd post.We are all entitled to our opinions.I don't feel I was "schooled" as someone said.I am trying to promote some discussion during this lull before the season starts.Why don't the home games sell out?During the Spoonball era crowds at Scottrade reached 20,000.The team this year was just as succesful,going to the 2nd round of the NCAA Tournament yet an average attendence of only 7700 in a great on campus facility.This was even baffling to RM as he seemed at a loss as to why no sell-outs at the end of the regular season.One reason in my opinion is the upper deck ticket prices are way too high.Your thoughts?

Not sure where you got that RM was baffled - he has always been pretty complimentary of the fans. In fact, we had two very large crowds at the end of the season -for all intents and purposes they were sell outs. Those teams under Spoon you are referring to that drew 20K - not remembering that many that high but why argue - those were games that had unique set ups - there were double headers with 3 very good teams plus us for example and alot of those tix were sold for next to nothing just to fill the cavern up. Even when Spoon wanted to build an on campus arena he was talking about only 13-15K so he knew that drawing 20K was not sustainable. Watch this year - the team will draw better and get some sell outs also.

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I'll speculate that Spoon was more of a PR guy than RM. Spoon had that down home kind of show on KMOX and the fact that the team was winning, a lot of folks, who were not SLU alumni, just came out to watch "Spoonball". RM will never do that. He'll leave it up to the team to bring out the fans. But if in fact we only averaged 7700 last year, that is disappointing.

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There are a number of mitigating factors. The economy was much better then than now; the Cardinals stank in the '90s; there was no football team here in the '90s. I'm sure there are others.

And Coach Majerus has expressed some dismay — I wouldn't say he's literally baffled, even if he uses the term — that attendance hasn't been greater.

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Ask an old timer. My father has been going to the games since the 50s. SLU has never been a huge draw. We went big time with Spoon and held on to that for a few years until attendance crashed with Soderberg and in Majerus' first couple years. Those Spoon years were a complete aberration. To expect us to come close to that again goes completely against the historical trends. If we can average 8000 or more the next few years it will be another golden age for the program. Not something to complain about.

You can come up with a myriad of reasons why we should have more fans but we don't. We never have & we never will. Our peak should selling out 3/4 of our games. That is what I hope for and that falls in line with most schools our size in large metropolitan areas. Nothing to be ashamed about.

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You can come up with a myriad of reasons why we should have more fans but we don't. We never have & we never will. Our peak should selling out 3/4 of our games. That is what I hope for and that falls in line with most schools our size in large metropolitan areas. Nothing to be ashamed about.

I know why alot of students dont go to games. Noone really cares if we beat Fordham/GW/Lasalle/Duquesne/St. Bonaventure/Rhode Island. I bought overpriced student season tickets every year and post on this board and even I dont really care if we beat those teams. Ive never seen their schools, dont know anyone who goes there and frankly didnt know where some of them were even located.

In regards to our old conference while spoon was coaching - having closer rivals really does help attendence. Now, those rivals were big names. In no way will i ever suggest a move to the MVC - that is a weak conference and is going nowhere. I think SLU is perfect where it is right now - build those Butler/Xavier/Dayton rivalries and hopefully Big east bball schools will be forced out (Theres no way theyd leave on their own) and hopefully we can start a great 12 team league.

Attendence should be up high early next year. A win against Kansas, if it plays out that way, would make the states of missouri and kansas do a collective double take. Then youd see an attendance explosion.

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I know why alot of students dont go to games. Noone really cares if we beat Fordham/GW/Lasalle/Duquesne/St. Bonaventure/Rhode Island. I bought overpriced student season tickets every year and post on this board and even I dont really care if we beat those teams. Ive never seen their schools, dont know anyone who goes there and frankly didnt know where some of them were even located.

In regards to our old conference while spoon was coaching - having closer rivals really does help attendence. Now, those rivals were big names. In no way will i ever suggest a move to the MVC - that is a weak conference and is going nowhere. I think SLU is perfect where it is right now - build those Butler/Xavier/Dayton rivalries and hopefully Big east bball schools will be forced out (Theres no way theyd leave on their own) and hopefully we can start a great 12 team league.

Attendence should be up high early next year. A win against Kansas, if it plays out that way, would make the states of missouri and kansas do a collective double take. Then youd see an attendance explosion.

Yes, who cares or who can relate to any team in the A-10 except X, Dayton, and Temple?. The rest are mostly irrelevant. Fordham? RI?

And the pre season schedule for the last few yrs has been uninteresting... though getting better. Who wants to see Austin Peay, Ill Springfield, Texas Southern, Tennessee State, South Carolina State, Jacksonville, IUPIU, etc?

And the economy during the Spoon years was much, much more robust.

And Spoon brought excitement... he was a pioneer, one of the first to understand the percentages in focusing on a 3 point attack.

I think things will pick up a bit now that we made the NCAA's.

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I'm back for my 2nd post.We are all entitled to our opinions.I don't feel I was "schooled" as someone said.I am trying to promote some discussion during this lull before the season starts.Why don't the home games sell out?During the Spoonball era crowds at Scottrade reached 20,000.The team this year was just as succesful,going to the 2nd round of the NCAA Tournament yet an average attendence of only 7700 in a great on campus facility.This was even baffling to RM as he seemed at a loss as to why no sell-outs at the end of the regular season.One reason in my opinion is the upper deck ticket prices are way too high.Your thoughts?

The fact that you were correctly called out in your first thread for being a troll shows that you were schooled. Your second post reaffirms that you are a troll. It simply is factually wrong. You say no sell outs at the end of the regular season? The Xavier game was a sell out. And when has Majerus ever been "baffled" by the crowds? PHe has been consistently complimentary of the fan support and said it again in a recent interview that we would be 3rd in the conference in attendance. You're just making sh!t up. Beating up trolls is fun to do during this "lull before the season starts." :lol:

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Not sure where you got that RM was baffled - he has always been pretty complimentary of the fans. In fact, we had two very large crowds at the end of the season -for all intents and purposes they were sell outs. Those teams under Spoon you are referring to that drew 20K - not remembering that many that high but why argue - those were games that had unique set ups - there were double headers with 3 very good teams plus us for example and alot of those tix were sold for next to nothing just to fill the cavern up. Even when Spoon wanted to build an on campus arena he was talking about only 13-15K so he knew that drawing 20K was not sustainable. Watch this year - the team will draw better and get some sell outs also.

He's not. The troll who started this thread is making sh!t up. RM recently praised the fans again and said we would again be among the league leaders in attendance (Dayton has an advantage due to the size of their arena). SLU was ranked 66th in the nation in attendance. Not too bad for a program that had not been to the Big Dance in more than a decade. In our last four games, two sellouts (Dayton and Xavier), plus more than 9,000 against Fordham.

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I have always wanted to talk about this b/c the local media tends to go off on all kinds of tangents when SLU has the 1st little bit of success but does not draw right away. SLUs crowds increase exponentially with success. And not just short-term winning streaks but NCAA tourney threatening amounts of wins. Spoon's 2nd year was the big winning streak where the SIU game that was 9 games in just sold out, a huge increase in attendance that was sustained. If it wasn't for the LMU game last year, the same thing might have occurred. Instead, it did not happen until the Dayton game. Dayton, Fordham, and Xavier were all big attendance games at the end of the season.

This season, there will be a huge jump in attendance, assuming nothing drastic happens, like injuries, etc.

By the way, I tried to get tickets for the Fordham game couple hours before game time, but there were no available seats next to each other. Then I saw attendance was mid-9000, so I was surprised 2 seats were not next to each other.

Also, Fordhams initials are FU - I love seeing that on the scoreboard when they visit SLU.

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Lets be honest about CUSA and the supposed regional opponents we got from that conf. Memphis and Louisville and Cincy were it at the back end of our time in it. - now we get Dayton and X and will be able to add Butler to it next year. Truth is that Tulane, S.Miss, S. FL, Houston are not big draws here and never were. At one time when DePaul and Marq were in CUSA then you might make a point with them and Louisville, Cincy and Memphis but that was in the beginning and not throughout the entire time.

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Not so sure about this - the student attendance this year was very good compared to other years.

The students were hot and cold. Some games they were great and other days they sucked.

For anybody suggesting our attendance wasn't disapointing at times, I offer this piece. I almost never agree with Burwell but he was right this one time.

http://www.stltoday.com/sports/columns/bryan-burwell/burwell-billikens-do-their-part-so-where-are-the-people/article_30607610-5862-11e1-b2e5-0019bb30f31a.html

And for more of a national perspective, read this piece which gets into the attendance troubles everyone is having these days.

http://athleticbusiness.com/articles/article.aspx?articleid=3883&zoneid=34

Lastly, I think attendance will be noticeably better next year as long as we continue to play well.

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Hopefully this season will see much higher attendance. I remember Burwell called out SLU fans in a column, but he was only at the Richmond game where there was about 7000 people, but then praised the same fans for showing up at the Xavier game. It is definitely hot and cold.

Also, with a better non-conference schedule, it should draw more people, let's face it, last year there were so many small teams that we were going to beat (Texas Southern and Alabama State to just name two) it did not generate enough interest. Also, the first 1,000 students get in free, no reason for students not to show up.

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Hopefully this season will see much higher attendance. I remember Burwell called out SLU fans in a column, but he was only at the Richmond game where there was about 7000 people, but then praised the same fans for showing up at the Xavier game. It is definitely hot and cold.

Also, with a better non-conference schedule, it should draw more people, let's face it, last year there were so many small teams that we were going to beat (Texas Southern and Alabama State to just name two) it did not generate enough interest. Also, the first 1,000 students get in free, no reason for students not to show up.

We aren't going to have a noticeably better non-con home schedule. SIUC and New Mexico are the headliners whereas Washington was it last year.

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Complicated issue... but I can see why RM would be disappointed in the student section. I attend every game as I am in the pep band and on most nights we are the more energetic half and when there is a big crowd (Whiteout/Blueout) the two sides can never get it together... that is a whole different conversation, but I would say the general public has supported the Billikens very well considering the circumstances. Almost no one comes to Billiken games to see other teams considering we play no name schools or schools that have no significance such as Charlotte, RI, Richmond, Fordham, etc. and our non conference schedule last year (Vermont, UIS, Portland? (can't remember), etc) is not very exciting. Hopefully one day with the building of the A10 we can start to get a better non conference schedule, possibly a Mizzou game, a continuation of the New Years Eve NM game, look for a Marquette or a Memphis game, and the stronger our team gets the more likely we are to have a non conference schedule like Xavier with Vanderbilt, Tennessee, etc. This will help bring in a stronger city and campus crowd. I can honestly say last year I was not disappointed with the crowd at any games, my only disappointment was with the Slunatics...

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We aren't going to have a noticeably better non-con home schedule. SIUC and New Mexico are the headliners whereas Washington was it last year.

New Mexico is not a bad game at all, but there are flaws with the non-conference home schedule. However, with the CBE classic and Stanford, our overall non-conference schedule is certainly better than last year which hopefully could translate over to higher attendance in our home games even if we don't have the strongest opponents.

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I would be more concerned if this coming season's attendance averaged 7700 than fretting about last year's numbers. Last season was the year that the team needed to get fans to buy in and believe. Eventually, that happened, but at times there was still some apprehension and caution, especially after the Bills lost 3 of 4 in early January (@NM, @Dayton, vs. Temple). That most likely explains why the St. Bonnie game had an attendance of about 6K., as it was the following home game after the Temple loss.

Basically, St. Louis is a front-running sports city. If a team wins, then they will show up. Just ask the Rams, or the previous example of Spoonball. As long as the Bills do as well or better than last season, we will see the attendance figures rise and games become hot tickets.

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A few people of hit the target on how complicated the problem is, although I would say that we are painting our numbers with a pretty negative brush. If this Bills team, and going forward, could manage to produce about 90% capacity through the year, with 4-5 sell outs, you would be surprised how high that would put us on the national attendance average for CBB.

My roommate goes to Baylor, a team that been in the Elite 8 two out of the last three years, their average attendance was worse then ours at about 7,400. Notre Dame- the Catholic program that every other Catholic school is trying to emulate, average attendance of 7,999...

Perhaps our numbers are not as bad as we think they are, they just look poor when compared to the odd, off-the-chart spoon numbers. If we aim to be a venue that is close capacity every night, we are going to be a program that averages very respectable numbers, more importantly, the Chaifetz was built well to make 10,000 feel like 14,000, it will make us a tougher place to play.

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A few people of hit the target on how complicated the problem is, although I would say that we are painting our numbers with a pretty negative brush. If this Bills team, and going forward, could manage to produce about 90% capacity through the year, with 4-5 sell outs, you would be surprised how high that would put us on the national attendance average for CBB.

My roommate goes to Baylor, a team that been in the Elite 8 two out of the last three years, their average attendance was worse then ours at about 7,400. Notre Dame- the Catholic program that every other Catholic school is trying to emulate, average attendance of 7,999...

Perhaps our numbers are not as bad as we think they are, they just look poor when compared to the odd, off-the-chart spoon numbers. If we aim to be a venue that is close capacity every night, we are going to be a program that averages very respectable numbers, more importantly, the Chaifetz was built well to make 10,000 feel like 14,000, it will make us a tougher place to play.

Good post. By comparison, Butler averaged a little over 7,000 this past year for their 10,000 seat arena. Now granted they had a rough season and they jacked up ticket prices pretty good from previous years, but this is after back-to-back national title games. It goes to show that when you aren't a huge state school or are located in a city with other sports dollar options, its not easy to get people to come.

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A few people of hit the target on how complicated the problem is, although I would say that we are painting our numbers with a pretty negative brush. If this Bills team, and going forward, could manage to produce about 90% capacity through the year, with 4-5 sell outs, you would be surprised how high that would put us on the national attendance average for CBB.

My roommate goes to Baylor, a team that been in the Elite 8 two out of the last three years, their average attendance was worse then ours at about 7,400. Notre Dame- the Catholic program that every other Catholic school is trying to emulate, average attendance of 7,999...

Perhaps our numbers are not as bad as we think they are, they just look poor when compared to the odd, off-the-chart spoon numbers. If we aim to be a venue that is close capacity every night, we are going to be a program that averages very respectable numbers, more importantly, the Chaifetz was built well to make 10,000 feel like 14,000, it will make us a tougher place to play.

Great post/reasonable expectation for the future. Those mid-December games vs. the Alabama A&M's of the world also help skew our numbers a bit.

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