MBB Game 1 - Canisius

[stuball888]

The St johns game was sold out weeks in advance and a couple hundred still showed up looking for scalpers. Place was loudest I have ever heard the MACK.

[Dooku25]

I could be wrong, but the only other sellouts in that arena's history besides the SJU game were both AE championship games vs. Delaware ('00, '01) I definitely remember seeing scalpers before those games. Mike and Mad dog did the play by play. Exciting times.. Probably the biggest reason I still follow the program today is because of that experience between 99-01 as a student.

We've had some other games close to selling out like the quarterfinal NIT game vs ODU (I remember sitting behind the basket in the last row) and also the George Mason game when they were nationally ranked was a great crowd as well.

It's almost hard to believe we have NEVER been able to host a game vs a power conference school since that St Johns game. And that was 10 or 11 years ago. The best way to get local sports fans or alumni to come is to get a big name school to come play and you'll have a sellout or close to it automatically. Win that game and people will come back. I know the power conference schools don't want to come, but we have to do better than 0 for 10 years if your serious about building a fan base.

[garyg]

I do not think you are wrong Dooku25...what you stated sounds about right...but we have sold out a number of times and there were scalpers for a few games...if we have done before we can do again and hopefully we can continue to do again for longer period of time...team needs to show some real passion on the court....fans & media feed off that...

[EvanJ]

It's almost hard to believe we have NEVER been able to host a game vs a power conference school since that St Johns game. And that was 10 or 11 years ago. The best way to get local sports fans or alumni to come is to get a big name school to come play and you'll have a sellout or close to it automatically. Win that game and people will come back. I know the power conference schools don't want to come, but we have to do better than 0 for 10 years if your serious about building a fan base.

I don't know when the St. John's game was, but if it was 10 or 11 years ago it wasn't our most recent game vs. a power conference school. We hosted Nebraska in the NIT on March 16, 2006. http://bbstate.com/games/2006-03-16/NEB-HOFS has the box score.

[Dooku25]

Evan you are right about the Nebraska game, however that game was created by the NIT selection committee. Just to clarify, my point was about Hofstra scheduling a home game against a power conference school in their out of conference portion of their schedule. They built a 5,000 seat arena, do they really expect to fill it against the likes of Jacksonville, Florida Atlantic or St Francis Brooklyn??

[HUSID80]

We need to build OUR fan base... it is pitiful... we need a base of around 3,000...then when we have bigger games we can fill the place... right now our fan base is around 1,000....really poor.

[Dooku25]

And student turnout has always been a problem for us.

I saw the new Fordham coach rip fan attendance after their home opener. They’ve been bottom dwellers for 25 years and they were playing Queens College so I’m not sure what he was expecting.

Northeastern somehow got Michigan St. to play at Matthews Arena in December. Kudos to them. Can you imagine Tom Izzo bringing his team to the Mack to play Hofstra? That would be an instant sellout.

Hopefully the renovations at the Coliseum are completed in time for the Kentucky game. We could build some serious momentum growing our fan base by going into that game off an NCAA tournament berth

[garyg]

Only way attendance goes up is team must fulfill it's potential and Hofstra must layout an aggressive marketing program. If they do not know how to do it in house contract it out to advertising agency with perks based on results

[Jojogunne]

Doesn't Hofstra use an outside company to promote athletics?

[garyg]

Maybe they do but it may be time to make a change

[HUSID80]

My company did the marketing Pecora's last year and Jenkins' last year. We averaged over 3,000 per home game. Then they took the marketing in house...now I hear they are hiring an outside firm but I believe it's more for sponsorships than in game marketing, ticket sales...they can certainly use some help.

[Polito]

yeah those were pretty solid attendance years, no reason this revitalized program can't do at least as good or better

HUSID, let's collaborate and take it back!! Don't worry that I have no 'official' experience, I do have quite a few thoughts that I bet $$$ would help tremendously. Let's just say I stayed at a Holiday Inn and got knowledgable