People are not going to a lot of our sports these days. The diamond sports dropping attendance is a concern. Some of that is due to our aging fan base. A concern which has been brought up before which I share. Many young folks don't care about athletics at this level. Will be very difficult to change that perception even with winning at a high level. People in Acadiana have forgotten how important the university is to the welfare of the region. Talked to a big fan the other day and his response was the NIL/Transfer situation was turning him off of college athletics in general. I know this is going on everywhere but perhaps our people are more put off by the situation than in other areas.
As far as basketball goes, the ticketmaster and concession situation keeps a lot of folks away. Fortunately TicketMaster goes away for basketball next season. Schedule has also not been conducive to drawing fans. Four early season non conference games all held during the week, with 2 being non D1 contests. I wish that MAC game would have been in December vs Super Bowl Sunday. Students were also not back in class yet when conference play started. Team was also not playing as well early as now. Took awhile for this group to play together. The staff personality may be an issue to some people as well. How many I don't know. I don't think it is 1000 to 1500 however. We tend to be an echo chamber on this forum. I also think fewer people follow basketball in general than in the past. I do wonder if the improved play on the court in recent days can continue and even be built upon. If so, perhaps we see a few more people in February. We are about to play a few teams for the 2nd team. Those coaches will adjust based upon the way the first contest went. Can we handle their adjustments is a question that will be interesting to find out. Finally, the players performance recently indicates you will likely be entertained if you can find time/finances to get to a game. Notice I said likely, you never know how any individual game will turn out.