There’s an (another) article in the Blade today discussing the decline of attendance at college football games (focused on Ohio State) for a variety of reasons. Notre Dame just had their ~40 year streak of home sell outs end (last week and again this week).

For us the mid-week games certainly hurt, and the fact that the Rockets aren’t exactly setting the world on fire doesn’t help either.

It’s a nation-wide problem.

(11-22-2019 09:48 PM)RangerRocket Wrote:  There’s an (another) article in the Blade today discussing the decline of attendance at college football games (focused on Ohio State) for a variety of reasons. Notre Dame just had their ~40 year streak of home sell outs end (last week and again this week).

For us the mid-week games certainly hurt, and the fact that the Rockets aren’t exactly setting the world on fire doesn’t help either.

It’s a nation-wide problem.

I dont think another university in the MAC has done as much as UT to keep the stadium mordern and inviting. Nobody has suites like we do! And the East side renovation and two video boards really helped. We also always get six home games and sometimes seven. NIU sometimes only has five home games for example because they need revenue so badly.

(11-22-2019 10:53 AM)PaulJ Wrote:  

(11-22-2019 08:15 AM)UTerry Wrote:  

(11-21-2019 09:07 PM)Springboromark Wrote:  And some of you want UT in the AAC ? Never happen with that pitiful attendance figures. The only way that could ever happen is for Rocket basketball to be the driving force with 20 plus wins a season and average 6500-7000 a game. Then you have a chance.

Stupid weekday games really kills the attendance....Toledo plays them more than any other school in the conference. I believe it's part of the MAC's scheme to make Toledo look unattractive to other conferences. (I know losing doesn't help but that's self inflicted). But where would the MAC be without Toledo and it's corporate money???

UT has 9 consecutive seasons with at least 7 wins - that's why MAC keeps scheduling team into midweek games for the "national" coverage of a high profile winning program, beautiful campus and stadium, decent attendance (by MAC standards) and large number of players in NFL (points mentioned again and again during every game TV coverage). Of course I, and many others, would dispute the "national" coverage on ESPN2, ESPN+ but that's clearly how the MAC and UT Athletics view them.

Actually the MAC may just be acceding to the whims of ESPN. Toledo, NIU and Ohio all seem to play a lot of Maction mid week games as they are the blueblood programs. At EMU we had none last year. The only MAC Saturday game last week was CMU vs. BSU, both projected to be doormats in preseason. Smells to me like ESPN is suggesting the matchups.

The conference maintains the Maction games provide a lot of exposure and perhaps they do but I hate when the cameras pan the stands and exposes a crowd similar to a high school game. That cannot thrill a potential recruit.

I can make a suggestion to the MAC. Schedule EMU's home game with Toledo on a November week night next year but hold the game at Ford Field, a venue close to both fan bases where we won't freeze. Its been done before when we played CMU there.