Playoff Attendance Round 1

[Sitting Bull]

Here’s a recap from last year

Re: Playoff Attendance 1st Round
Here's a rundown of the attendance for Saturday's game ordered by how each home team drew compared to their regular season average (I'm going with what GannonFan said the Delaware attendance is likely to be since they still haven't reported - I'll update it if need be):

Gardner-Webb @ EKU: 4,973 (81.5% of EKU's regular season average of 6,101)
Idaho @ SLU: 3,174 (57.3% of SLU's regular season average of 5,530)
SEMO @ Montana: 13,390 (52.9% of Montana's regular season average of 25,298)
UND @ Weber St: 4,495 (51.0% of Weber St's regular season average of 8,891)
Davidson @ Richmond: 3,000 (41.2% of Richmond's regular season average 7,273)
Elon @ Furman: 2,717 (28.2% of Furman's regular season average of 9,646)
Fordham @ UNH: 2,989 (27.8% of UNH's regular season average of 10,758)
St Francis @ Delaware: 4,629 (27.4% of Delaware's regular season average of 16,902)


The average of 4,921 for the 8 first rounds games isn't that bad considering how tough of a draw it is on the Saturday after Thanksgiving. 2022 ranks 5th in the last 9 years (excluding the spring 2021 playoffs which had attendance restrictions) and the best since 2018 for first round attendance average:

2014: 7,297
2018: 6,373
2015: 5,634
2017: 4,958
2022: 4,921
2013: 4,502
2021: 3,837
2019: 3,598
2016: 3,408

[Professor Chaos]

Round 1 attendance figures.

Chattanooga @ Austin Peay: 7,249 (87.2% of Austin Peay's regular season average of 8,309)
NCCU @ Richmond: 4,103 (66.6% of Richmond's regular season average of 6,165)
Sac St @ UND: 6,522 (63.4% of UND's regular season average of 10,288)
Drake @ NDSU: 7,798 (51.6% of NDSU's regular season average of 15,121)
Nicholls @ SIU: 4,576 (48.5% of SIU's regular season average of 9,430)
Gardner-Webb @ Mercer: 4,500 (46.2% of Mercer's regular season average of 9,741)
Duquesne @ YSU: 3,866 (38.4% of YSU's regular season average of 10,065)
Lafayette @ Delaware: 4,039 (26.0% of Delaware's regular season average of 15,564)

Not too bad overall - average attendance for the first round games of 5,332 is the highest it's been since 2018 and 4th highest in the 10 (normal) playoffs since 2013. Generally anything better than 50% of your regular season average on Thanksgiving Saturday is good so good on the fans of Austin Peay and Chattanooga for getting them to nearly 90% of APSU's regular season average. I'd assume next weekend will tick up the averages significantly getting out of the holiday weekend and with the host schools having 2 weeks to sell tickets (and some big draws like Montana and Montana St hosting).

[Puddin Tane]

I guess i can sorta, maybe understand some of these. With big Fbs rivalry games all day. I know we would lose attendance to the walmart ut, aggy and lsu fans.


BUT im uneducated in the ways of the northeast and the dakotas. The attendance in the dakotas and Delaware? Who are they fighting with for fans? Or is it too much turkey? Too much espn? Deer season?

[Go Lehigh TU Owl]

I guess i can sorta, maybe understand some of these. With big Fbs rivalry games all day. I know we would lose attendance to the walmart ut, aggy and lsu fans.


BUT im uneducated in the ways of the northeast and the dakotas. The attendance in the dakotas and Delaware? Who are they fighting with for fans? Or is it too much turkey? Too much espn? Deer season?

Newark, DE is right along the I-95 corridor in the middle of the Megalopolis. Add in Thanksgiving weekend and you need to pack your patience to make the drive there if you live more than 30 or 45 minutes away....

[Professor Chaos]

I guess i can sorta, maybe understand some of these. With big Fbs rivalry games all day. I know we would lose attendance to the walmart ut, aggy and lsu fans.


BUT im uneducated in the ways of the northeast and the dakotas. The attendance in the dakotas and Delaware? Who are they fighting with for fans? Or is it too much turkey? Too much espn? Deer season?
Everywhere competes with the Thanksgiving holiday. Selling tickets during a short week when a lot of people have plans and there's no students around is tough.

[KnightoftheRedFlash]

FBS rivalry weekend, bad weather, Thanksgiving, lackluster matchups, no students, etc. etc.

It is a rough weekend to start the playoffs on.

[POD Knows]

I guess i can sorta, maybe understand some of these. With big Fbs rivalry games all day. I know we would lose attendance to the walmart ut, aggy and lsu fans.


BUT im uneducated in the ways of the northeast and the dakotas. The attendance in the dakotas and Delaware? Who are they fighting with for fans? Or is it too much turkey? Too much espn? Deer season?Well, the Bison played Drake, so there is that, but I still thought there was an outside chance at 10K as I heard that the ticket sales were close to that (internet lie). NDSU lately has had bad crowds at playoff games until the semi finals. Hunting is a thing up here and there are no students to be found on campus.

[Pards Rule]

I guess i can sorta, maybe understand some of these. With big Fbs rivalry games all day. I know we would lose attendance to the walmart ut, aggy and lsu fans.


BUT im uneducated in the ways of the northeast and the dakotas. The attendance in the dakotas and Delaware? Who are they fighting with for fans? Or is it too much turkey? Too much espn? Deer season?

IDK..Me personally I have NO interest in FBS games (I guess we may have to change the vernacular as FBS is going to a 12 team playoff - hey Im ok back to D1 and D1-AA - easier to think of and say in convo) as I never went to an FBS school. There is a lot of Penn State fans in metro Philly and I get overdosed with them bantering on about how they will be NCs every year that inevitably turns to "should be" after they lose to OSU and Michigan. In fact I root against them its so overwhelming. So for the NE or Dakotas, I would have to say its the holidays. I was at the Lafayette-UNH playoff 10 years ago and the crowd was only about 5K - for mild weather I guess considering post Tgiving up there - 100% sunny, we sat in sun, and 30 degrees high and NO wind. There definitely was more fans for the Lafayette games I went to regular season on Sept in recent years at Newark, DE. Even the tailgate zones were very open I noted. Pards had a very good turnout for the game though

[Pard4Life]

Newark, DE is right along the I-95 corridor in the middle of the Megalopolis. Add in Thanksgiving weekend and you need to pack your patience to make the drive there if you live more than 30 or 45 minutes away....

That's the reason why I did not go yesterday...

[Sitting Bull]

It’s a tough weekend for first round games. Everyone gets that.

Glad the numbers were up and overall pretty good. I was just surprised that Delaware and Youngstown were both as low as shown.

[Pards Rule]

It’s a tough weekend for first round games. Everyone gets that.

Glad the numbers were up and overall pretty good. I was just surprised that Delaware and Youngstown were both as low as shown.

I can attest it was about 4K. LARGE open spaces in UD tailgate reservation spots in parking area. Lafayette prob honestly made up half of the crowd! I cant recall the crowd back in 2004 playoff game even though I was there too. It seemed there were more back then as I recall sitting near end (section I) and there were some dustups between UD and Pard fans in 2004, I think because Hens expected a rout and we played them to the final 2 minutes when game decided (as in this game).

[nodak651]

I guess i can sorta, maybe understand some of these. With big Fbs rivalry games all day. I know we would lose attendance to the walmart ut, aggy and lsu fans.


BUT im uneducated in the ways of the northeast and the dakotas. The attendance in the dakotas and Delaware? Who are they fighting with for fans? Or is it too much turkey? Too much espn? Deer season?

UND often has to compete with its own hockey team. Between the two sports, UND sold 29,843 tickets over the weekend (fri and sat), so there were probably enough people in town to draw better than we did for FB, despite it being Thanksgiving weekend. I'm not sure how much hockey being at home affects 1st round attendance though, because I'm guessing it helps to draw in out of towners, but locally, there is only so much time and money that people can allocate to sports, so if they are already planning to attend hockey in the evening, it may be harder for people to justify attending a fb game scheduled on short notice, in addition to that. Our play after the Bison game didn't exactly help either.

[Pards Rule]

I submoit Lafayette would have drawn 5-7K for its first home playoff game ever. Great team and home playoff. Are the unique circumstances taken into consideration?