Things we talk about when our season has ended...

[barechestcat]

What does your school do to promote student attendance at the game?

Does your school's game environment cater to casual fans who may be there for socializing and entertainment value away from the actual football game? If so, what kind of things?

side note: I realize that pretty much everyone on this board is a true football fan and may hate the idea of distractions from the game. But, I think that it's necessary if you want to develop strong attendance/support from casual fans in the community.

[DSUrocks07]

What does your school do to promote student attendance at the game?

Does your school's game environment cater to casual fans who may be there for socializing and entertainment value away from the actual football game? If so, what kind of things?

side note: I realize that pretty much everyone on this board is a true football fan and may hate the idea of distractions from the game. But, I think that it's necessary if you want to develop strong attendance/support from casual fans in the community.

xwhistlex

not saying a word...

[PhoenixPhan]

What does your school do to promote student attendance at the game?

Does your school's game environment cater to casual fans who may be there for socializing and entertainment value away from the actual football game? If so, what kind of things?

side note: I realize that pretty much everyone on this board is a true football fan and may hate the idea of distractions from the game. But, I think that it's necessary if you want to develop strong attendance/support from casual fans in the community.

Students always get in free, and our student section is smack in the middle of the home side, which is nice. Recently, we've started having "gimmicks" at several games that they'll hand out to the first few hundred students (pom poms or thunder sticks, etc.) Last year they always had tshirts with funny sayings on the back for $5, but I'm not sure what happened to those.

Unfortunately, because Elon went through a pretty good stretch of not having a good football team, we're still trying to build our fanbase back up. It's a very Greek school, so there's always a lot of frat guys getting drunk at tailgates and sorority girls socializing in their sundresses. The greek organizaions definitely encourage students to go to the game, but most of them don't pay much attention to the game. We do have a group of students called the phoenix phanatics that are crazy and loud and awesome to see on game days, though.

As our team has gotten better so has student support. Bad weather kept a lot away this year, but I really think we could have much better turnout next season, especially since we finally made playoffs this year.

[nms1987]

It's a very Greek school, so there's always a lot of frat guys getting drunk at tailgates and sorority girls socializing in their sundresses. The greek organizaions definitely encourage students to go to the game, but most of them don't pay much attention to the game.

I have nothing against Greek organizations but surely there is something Elon can do to discourage them from holding formals during football games. Greek life is supposed to augment the student life at the university and help promote the university. Competing with the football team is not fair to the university endorses these organizations
Too often the attitude is that the school revolves around Sigma Chi (or whoever), rather than Sigma Chi revolving around the alma mater. Too many people that I know are Sigma Chi fans first, and fans/students/alums of their schools second.

[ThompsonThe]

Building large end zone seating.

[BEAR]

We talk about former UCA Defensive player and new head coach at Louisville Charlie Strong and how he came in second for the Frank Broyles award. xlolx

http://www.gatorzone.com/football/images/tmpimg2008/StrongCharlie08Tenn01casey.jpg


Strong played on the football and track and field teams. He was a two-time All-AIC selection for football and a three-year letterman on the track team. Strong is a successful assistant under Urban Meyer on the Florida Gators.

[93henfan]

Delaware is always trying to please the fan, by doing things like:

1. Banning kegs in the parking lot
2. Barring reentry for folks who want to tailgate at halftime
3. Not opening parking lots until three hours before gametime and forcing everyone out an hour after
4. Charging $15 for general parking and $25 for reserved for this four hours of partying
5. Forcing fans to make a minimum $100 donation to keep the reserved parking spot they had for decades, and then reordering the spots based on donation level.
6. Holding the specter of similar reshuffling of seating over our heads
7. Reserving 3,000 seats at Chatty for an 11,000+ season ticket base in 2007
8. Making zero improvements to the stadium over several decades, save for an upgrade to a scoreboard that barely worked from 91 - 07, and then finally updating to a real video board last year and a small scoreboard in the south end zone so people in the north end zone could know what quarter it is

Yeah, our athletic department cares about us.

[Reign of Terrier]

I have a feeling App fans will be talking about how to replace Armanti

[ASU Tailgaiteer]

Delaware is always trying to please the fan, by doing things like:

2. Barring reentry for folks who want to tailgate at halftime
..

That's interesting. Do most schools in the CAA allow this?

I've been to many FCS and ACC stadiums in the Carolinas and the only one that allows a free pass out at halftime is Carter-Finley (NC State). I just about flipped out when I saw the mass exodus the first time.

[msugrizzly]

That's interesting. Do most schools in the CAA allow this?

I've been to many FCS and ACC stadiums in the Carolinas and the only one that allows a free pass out at halftime is Carter-Finley (NC State). I just about flipped out when I saw the mass exodus the first time.

Not sure about the CAA but i think every school in the big sky lets fans go out at halftime. I was shocked last year at finley stadium when they wouldn't let us leave at half to tailgate

[JMU Newbill]

From the student-support-standpoint at JMU, I know that football support at our school was largely increased due to 2 things:

1) Winning the national championship in 2004 (my junior year)
2) Easing up on the tailgating rules to allow campus to become a huge block party on game day

Since then, it's really taken off at JMU.

[JMUNJ08]

From the student-support-standpoint at JMU, I know that football support at our school was largely increased due to 2 things:

1) Winning the national championship in 2004 (my junior year)
2) Easing up on the tailgating rules to allow campus to become a huge block party on game day

Since then, it's really taken off at JMU.

The championship really did get the students out. It was my freshman year, I came in at game time or midway through the 1st quarter and sat at the 40. I never understood why everyone left after seeing the MRDs. We were good but didn't have the NC in our pocket yet. Last year I was only able to get endzone or upper corner 30 minutes before the game after standing in a LONG line to get in. Most games had 1-2K standing inside the gates.

From 20 yard line to 20 yard line the student section gets thunder sticks every game. There is a giant moon bounce for kids, free Student Duke Club tailgate food, Pep Rallys for big games, and free specialty t-shirts for 500 or so students to homecoming/other big game. The best gimmick is the "Madison Purple Out" "I bleed purple" t-shirts which are given out the day before our homecoming game. Thousands of shirts are given away in a mass frenzy after the homecoming parade. I did it twice, not fun but the shirt was worth it!!!!

The past 2+ years they have tightened down though on tailgating. Really bothering students more than making sure people are safe. The main tailgating spot was taken away for reserved parking which no one parks in so the main area for students is cut in half with an expanding population. With stadium expansion there should be even more people coming to tailgate so it will be interesting to see if the university will cater to the increase in spectators or will further squash what has been an insanely fast growing tailgate scene. The app state tailgate was like a house party. You seriously could not move!!!!!

Don't let us down JMU!!!!

I know I'm forgetting stuff so someone please help me out!

[ashram]

Furman has free parking for everyone and no rules about when you can start tailgating. Re-entry after halftime is no problem. A lot of times there's not even someone there checking for ticket stubs. It is, though, technically still a dry campus. I've never had a problem with that though (post-graduation at least).

Student support definitely seems to depend on how our season is going. We have a small group of die-hard students who are there every game and who go to away games, but, probably like a lot of other schools, we have a large contingent of students who are there to be seen in and to show off their outfits the first half and don't care about football at all.

Furman does have a ticket sales coordinator who does a great job of running promotions, and he definitely seems to listen to the ideas of fans to try to bring more people in. He does a great job considering the size of our alumni base.

[813Jag]

Main discussion at Southern is who the new coach will be and rebuilding support and attendance.

[JALMOND]

Main discussion at Southern is who the new coach will be and rebuilding support and attendance.

Sounds like Portland State. Although now that we have a coach, we are now refocusing efforts on how to get fans back in the seats.