(03-12-2019 10:12 AM)quo vadis Wrote:  

(01-22-2019 07:36 PM)Captain Bearcat Wrote:  

(01-22-2019 06:07 PM)dbackjon Wrote:  

(01-22-2019 06:01 PM)YNot Wrote:  

(01-22-2019 04:46 PM)UTEPDallas Wrote:  There’s more fans of G5 conferences on this board than Pac-12 fans. That doesn’t mean in real life the AAC or C-USA has more fans than the Pac-12.

This has been discussed multiple times. It’s a different culture out West. People have interest in other sports, not just football like in other regions of the country. People act like if this is a new thing for “the Conference of Champions”. News flash, it’s always been that way and it’ll stay that way for the foreseeable future. The difference between them and the ACC and Big XII is that all of its schools want to be there (unlike the Big XII) and they share similar profiles (unlike the ACC) in being mostly flagship/land grant institutions. Geography is their blessing and their curse too. They won’t be raided by the B1G but I can see a scheduling agreement with the Big XII. Perhaps they can share the same network and change the name from P12N to something else.

Larry Scott is part of the problem. But school presidents are the ones who make decisions and they still keep him employed. Pac-12 fans have the right to be angry at Scott but if I was one if them, I’d direct my anger at presidents and ADs.

Not so fast. From the 2017 NCAA football attendance report:

http://fs.ncaa.org/Docs/stats/football_r...e/2017.pdf

- PAC = 3,918,463 total attendance (over 79 games, 49,601 average)

- G5 = 7,830,693 total attendance (over 365 games, 21,453 average)
(AAC + MWC + CUSA + Sun Belt + MAC)

So, while each individual PAC 12 school has better attendance than the average G5 school, there are about TWICE as many G5 fans that attend games as there are PAC fans. (These numbers are likely a little skewed in favor of the PAC, because it's more common for a PAC 12 school to have 7 home games, while it is quite uncommon for the average G5 school to have more than 6 home games).

And, given the laid back sports culture and ample other options out West, the PAC 12 fans tend to be less devoted and less interested. So, you would expect the G5 fans to be at least twice as prevalent as PAC 12 fans.

This is one of the issues that fan message boards overlook - that G5 fans actually do make up about 20-25% of the FBS college football fan base. They will always be the minority, but they're significant. Obviously, the "Power 5" makes up the overwhelming majority, but no single conference dominates.

Based on attendance, here's the breakdown:

- G5 23.3% (7,830,693)
- SEC 21.8% (7,357,228)
- Big Ten 18.7% (6,291,534)
- ACC 13.4% (4,504,142)
- PAC 11.6% (3,918,463)
- Big 12 10.9% (3,695,374)

Home Attendance, Division I-FCS 5,123,547

Ergo, FCS is more popular than ACC, Big 12 or the PAC-12.

I'd roll with that. If you total up the "t-shirt fans" of all FCS schools, I think they'd equal those conferences.

I'd bet their total athletic budgets and total TV ratings are comparable too. Because there's 10 times as many of them.

Texas is the #1 school in athletic revenue with $214 million. Here's the FCS public schools that have more than 1/10th of Texas's athletic revenue: Delaware, UC-Davis, Stony Brook, William & Mary, Sacramento State, Rhode Island, North Dakota, Illinois State, Montana, Towson, Missouri State, Kennesaw State, Idaho, Albany, Omaha, Southern Illinois, South Dakota State, Montana State, and Vermont. I'd bet anything that Villanova, Georgetown, Butler, Dayton, and most of the Ivies also pass that $21.4 million threshold.

But he makes a good point: You add up the media appeal of Delaware, UC-Davis, Stony, WM, Sac State, RI, ND, IS, Montana, and Towson and it isn't a thimble compared to that of Texas.

So adding up attendance and/or revenue isn't a totally accurate gauge of popularity. Texas football games draw the interest of LOTS of people who don't attend Texas games or give money to Texas - like me.

There are more schools in FCS that made more money over the lower end of FBS because they get better crowds. The problem I have seen with the new additions of realignment actually hurt the attendance overall. Delaware is one of the schools that actually have FBS size crowds compared to schools like San Jose State, Eastern Michigan, Georgia State and so forth.