(02-27-2017 06:10 PM)greyowl72 Wrote:  

(02-27-2017 03:30 PM)Not-So-Wise Owl Wrote:  

(02-27-2017 03:08 PM)MemOwl Wrote:  I'll add one more thought.

If the Rice Admissions committee has managed to admit a student body that doesn't give a lick about college sports, to the point that kids in the residential colleges don't fill out March Madness brackets, then I believe that all is lost.

Would love to have some intell from folks on campus in about 2 weeks. Would love to know if students, faculty and staff are filling out brackets.

I want to be hopeful. i think an awful lot of Rice students apply to Duke, for example, and at Duke kids sleep in tents for 6 weeks to get tickets to one game.

Wanted to add input as a current student- from what I can tell, significantly less than half of the student body cares enough about college basketball (or sports in general) to fill out March Madness brackets. Beyond small groups of friends that are very sports oriented, the undergraduate population generally lacks any sort of knowledge or passion regarding sports.

Do I think we'd get more students out to games if we were able to schedule better OOC home games? Sure. But I don't think it'd be nearly the increase that many here seem to believe.

Thanks for the perspective. I think most of us on this board thought that was the case.
A huge change from when the older alums were at Rice.

IMHO, the big decline in attendance happened in the last 2-3 Braun years and the year in the wilderness. I am not convinced that this was a 1965 issue as I remember larger crowds in the horrific Bob Polk era than now, of course the student body was much more Texas centric (and less international) then and opponents were the SWC rather the unfamiliar multi directionals from a far off land.

Way more distractions and options for entertainment has impacted this a lot also. Think about a time before internet, smart phones and 500 channels on cable and when very few freshmen drove. College sports provided entertainment and you would get hooked. This and the conference has a lot to do with it. The big WAC years with Utah's, Fresno St and the like were greater an attraction than FIU and Marshall...

Same issue as for football.

I am just not convinced that "exciting style of play" has all that much to do with it in either sport. Interesting, relevant, and familiar opponents and competitive teams are way more important factors.

But many schools are struggling with the same issue. Geesh, even the orange ESU in Austin frequently can't fill their smallish (relatively speaking) student section.