Don't final exams start Monday? Maybe some of the students have their noses in books this weekend.

It's rough to get up hung over and go out in the cold and rain before noon. I did it, but I was a freaky weirdo.

Had this game been on campus the student section would have been full ( for the first half at least). Being off campus kills attendance numbers. Just be thankful we only had to do this for one year.

I admit to typically being critical of attendance and especially the Cincy media. Maybe it is the win or possibly some sort of Christmas Spirit, however I am in a good mood. 5 CH's in 7 years! Let that reverberate for a moment. A great accomplishment. I am happy for the players, coaches, and AD staff, who put in all the hard work. I am blessed for having the opportunity to watch the game today. I am thrilled to have spent quality time with great friends and family. I feel bad for those, who choose not to be there. You missed a fun and exciting, maybe nerve racking at times, afternoon. The City of Cincinnati has an unbelievable asset. A hidden gem. UC possess everything all the detractors claim they want to experience in Cincinnati. Those who were there and continue to come to games are the lucky ones. We experience first hand all that is good in this city. "Coming Home" video already has me chomping at the bit to experience 2015. First though, our team receives an opportunity to claim their 10th victory and another Bowl trophy for the war chest. So, as I sit here tonight I have come away feeling today was a success. We are the lucky ones. Hopefully, more can experience what we did in future games/years.

You guys know it was raining up until about 25 minutes before game time which means it was still falling in the northern and eastern part of the metro area up until game time. People look out their window and say "no." 39 degrees and steady rain are the worst possible ingredients for football attendance. After 24 hours of the stuff I'm sure many decided ESPN would be a better option.

From where I sat it seemed we were missing about 5,000 students, which is where the biggest attendance drop off occurred.

I wish I could make more bball games. I have had season football tix since Dantonio's last year. I have 3 little kids and coaching bball right now. Got to live in the moment, but dream of the day when I can attend a lot more games- with my boys.

Cincinnati fans are just fine. The real problem is they have too many options.

http://csnbbs.com/thread-599657.html

A lot of folks just had no interest in going downtown to PBS. I get it. I went but there were games I would have almost preferred to watch from the couch. Sterile as hell and I always feel like I am a 5 iron away from the play no matter where I sit. Students largely said the hell with it too. Had the season started off better than it did in those first 5 games, the gate would have been far better. Fireworks shows or not, a lot of folks decided to just sit on the sideline until 2015. This is not all on the fans. Customers are allowed to make informed choices regardless of the loyalty mandate from some.

For a fan base that has taken a beating the last few years, we have hung in there pretty good.. The base was growing every year in the Big East. If we have the jump to P5, there is no doubt that the support will grow and quickly to fill the new Nip....

(12-08-2014 12:13 PM)KCat Wrote:  For a fan base that has taken a beating the last few years, we have hung in there pretty good.. The base was growing every year in the Big East. If we have the jump to P5, there is no doubt that the support will grow and quickly to fill the new Nip....

This...

I think it is the competition. I mean... if this was an alternate universe where the Big East was still intact and we were playing Louisville or Pitt for the conference it might be a different story. Or if it was the CCG against TCU, it would've been different. We need rivalries. We need quality opponents.

The American Athletic Conference reeks of "small time / unimportant" -- and there is nothing more poisonous to fans in an otherwise major-league town (where major-league teams compete for world championships) than "small time / unimportant."

AAC football games are played mostly for pride and school spirit. There's no real shot of making the playoffs or winning a national championship. When the Bearcats were in the Big East, there was a sense that every game mattered. Being at the game was important. Now? On Saturday the Bearcats clinched a share of a title from a conference no one wants to be in. The sports world yawned and sent them to play a bowl game against a mid-tier ACC team. Can you blame the fans for yawning too?

(12-08-2014 02:09 PM)#41 Wrote:  The American Athletic Conference reeks of "small time / unimportant" -- and there is nothing more poisonous to fans in an otherwise major-league town (where major-league teams compete for world championships) than "small time / unimportant."

AAC football games are played mostly for pride and school spirit. There's no real shot of making the playoffs or winning a national championship. When the Bearcats were in the Big East, there was a sense that every game mattered. Being at the game was important. Now? On Saturday the Bearcats clinched a share of a title from a conference no one wants to be in. The sports world yawned and sent them to play a bowl game against a mid-tier ACC team. Can you blame the fans for yawning too?

Major league town? Are we still talking about Cincinnati? Yeah, those Bungles looked major league yesterday.

(12-08-2014 09:26 AM)rath v2.0 Wrote:  A lot of folks just had no interest in going downtown to PBS. I get it. I went but there were games I would have almost preferred to watch from the couch. Sterile as hell and I always feel like I am a 5 iron away from the play no matter where I sit. Students largely said the hell with it too. Had the season started off better than it did in those first 5 games, the gate would have been far better. Fireworks shows or not, a lot of folks decided to just sit on the sideline until 2015. This is not all on the fans. Customers are allowed to make informed choices regardless of the loyalty mandate from some.

You have to give the 25,000 fans a lot of credit for dealing with PBS on a terrible weather day. You put that game in Nippert and you could add about 5,000 fans. And if we were in the hunt for the Access bowl, you are talking another 5,000 fans. The average attendance this year was 28,850 with a high of 41,926 for Miami of Ohio.
Back home in a renovated Nippert, we should average about 37,000 to 39,000 with at least 3 sold out games including opening day (does not matter who we play), UCF, and probably Temple. Keep in mind, it was not long ago that the average attendance was about 18,000 fans (pre-Big East).

(12-08-2014 02:09 PM)#41 Wrote:  The American Athletic Conference reeks of "small time / unimportant" -- and there is nothing more poisonous to fans in an otherwise major-league town (where major-league teams compete for world championships) than "small time / unimportant."

AAC football games are played mostly for pride and school spirit. There's no real shot of making the playoffs or winning a national championship. When the Bearcats were in the Big East, there was a sense that every game mattered. Being at the game was important. Now? On Saturday the Bearcats clinched a share of a title from a conference no one wants to be in. The sports world yawned and sent them to play a bowl game against a mid-tier ACC team. Can you blame the fans for yawning too?

UC has an explosive offense with one of the best QB talents in the country. It has a winning tradition over the past decade that only the smallest handful of programs have been able to match. Its football team just won a share of the conference championship.

The racket that is college football thought enough of it to pair it up with a VaTech team that couldn't even manage a winning record in the regular season and went 3-5 in the ACC. If college football cares this much about UC football and the American, why do we expect the casual fan to care more?

(12-08-2014 02:30 PM)Bearcat61 Wrote:  

(12-08-2014 09:26 AM)rath v2.0 Wrote:  A lot of folks just had no interest in going downtown to PBS. I get it. I went but there were games I would have almost preferred to watch from the couch. Sterile as hell and I always feel like I am a 5 iron away from the play no matter where I sit. Students largely said the hell with it too. Had the season started off better than it did in those first 5 games, the gate would have been far better. Fireworks shows or not, a lot of folks decided to just sit on the sideline until 2015. This is not all on the fans. Customers are allowed to make informed choices regardless of the loyalty mandate from some.

You have to give the 25,000 fans a lot of credit for dealing with PBS on a terrible weather day. You put that game in Nippert and you could add about 5,000 fans. And if we were in the hunt for the Access bowl, you are talking another 5,000 fans. The average attendance this year was 28,850 with a high of 41,926 for Miami of Ohio.
Back home in a renovated Nippert, we should average about 37,000 to 39,000 with at least 3 sold out games including opening day (does not matter who we play), UCF, and probably Temple. Keep in mind, it was not long ago that the average attendance was about 18,000 fans (pre-Big East).

There's no doubt we have a very strong core of 18-20K or so die-hards. Nearly all of these people come to every home game, many travel if the game is in proximity (Pitt, WVU, Louisville, TN) and half of them go to bowls.

If the game was on campus we probably get another 5,000 just from the student body alone.

I do think #41 brings up a good point-- UC can't survive in the AAC long-term in this city. Not only are there professional sports options but we are surrounded by OSU, UK, Notre Dame, Louisville, Indiana and Purdue and many of their fans live in the region.

I think we are going to have really good attendance next season, and a shot at the access bowl.
Hopefully we host UCF, and we get the Hurricanes at Nippert, no OSU, BYU is on the road.

For those of you who went to the game and didn't catch it on TV. Sean McDonough said some really nice things about Nippert on the broadcast. (paraphrasing) Talked about how unique it was and said, a decent UC crowd at PBS doesn't look good because of the size, but if you put the same crowd at Nippert it is packed with a great atmosphere. Spielman agreed.

(12-08-2014 02:54 PM)CliftonAve Wrote:  

(12-08-2014 02:30 PM)Bearcat61 Wrote:  

(12-08-2014 09:26 AM)rath v2.0 Wrote:  A lot of folks just had no interest in going downtown to PBS. I get it. I went but there were games I would have almost preferred to watch from the couch. Sterile as hell and I always feel like I am a 5 iron away from the play no matter where I sit. Students largely said the hell with it too. Had the season started off better than it did in those first 5 games, the gate would have been far better. Fireworks shows or not, a lot of folks decided to just sit on the sideline until 2015. This is not all on the fans. Customers are allowed to make informed choices regardless of the loyalty mandate from some.

You have to give the 25,000 fans a lot of credit for dealing with PBS on a terrible weather day. You put that game in Nippert and you could add about 5,000 fans. And if we were in the hunt for the Access bowl, you are talking another 5,000 fans. The average attendance this year was 28,850 with a high of 41,926 for Miami of Ohio.
Back home in a renovated Nippert, we should average about 37,000 to 39,000 with at least 3 sold out games including opening day (does not matter who we play), UCF, and probably Temple. Keep in mind, it was not long ago that the average attendance was about 18,000 fans (pre-Big East).

There's no doubt we have a very strong core of 18-20K or so die-hards. Nearly all of these people come to every home game, many travel if the game is in proximity (Pitt, WVU, Louisville, TN) and half of them go to bowls.

If the game was on campus we probably get another 5,000 just from the student body alone.

I do think #41 brings up a good point-- UC can't survive in the AAC long-term in this city. Not only are there professional sports options but we are surrounded by OSU, UK, Notre Dame, Louisville, Indiana and Purdue and many of their fans live in the region.

I venture to say based on Saturday's attendance, there is a new core of 25,000 Bearcat football fans. There is an additional 10,000 casual fans that come and go depending on a number of factors including gametime (day and time), opponent (Miami,Oh., UCF are good draws and Miami, FL is a great draw), whether we are in the hunt for the Access Bowl, etc. Of course, you bring in Oklahoma or Texas and we are talking about 60,000 in attendance.
I have always said a great football town can only deliver about 100,000 fans per weekend. If you add the Bengals attendance to the Bearcats, you have your 100,000 fans and about 120,000 total when the Bearcats draw Oklahoma and the Bengals are in town. Said another way, if you put the Bengals in Columbus, Oh., the Buckeyes would only draw 50,000 fans.

I went to the game but left after the first quarter. Had club seats but they were not great. Really made me appreciate Nippert. Decided that rather than suffer in the cold, I would watch the second half from home. The weather was horrible this year for games after the first couple. 2 early byes did not help. There is little incentive to attend when the games are on TV, parking is expensive and the concessions are crazy. I believe other than the top teams you will see teams struggle with attendance with all of the better options to watch the game. The game experience is better attending but all the rest is worse

(12-08-2014 02:09 PM)#41 Wrote:  The American Athletic Conference reeks of "small time / unimportant" -- and there is nothing more poisonous to fans in an otherwise major-league town (where major-league teams compete for world championships) than "small time / unimportant."

AAC football games are played mostly for pride and school spirit. There's no real shot of making the playoffs or winning a national championship. When the Bearcats were in the Big East, there was a sense that every game mattered. Being at the game was important. Now? On Saturday the Bearcats clinched a share of a title from a conference no one wants to be in. The sports world yawned and sent them to play a bowl game against a mid-tier ACC team. Can you blame the fans for yawning too?

Just out of curiosity, what were our attendance numbers in the BEAST? I dont remember being sold out every game.