St. Mary's fans unimpressed by NIT

by Jeff Nusser on Mar 17, 2009 10:45 AM PDT

St. Mary's plays in the McKeon Pavilion, which seats 3,500. As of right now, on the St. Mary's Web site, you can still purchase ...

Second row tickets for $75 each.
Seventh row tickets in section AA of their upper reserved section for $20 each. (There are 11 rows in that section.)
Tickets in their general admission EE section for $15 each. (This is the midcourt GA section.)

I draw two conclusions from this.

Despite what anyone says, at the very least, the Gaels' fans are not excited about this game -- there are still a sizeable portion of those 3,500 seats left to sell. Seems to me that someone is a little to big for their britches if they think they're a little too good for the NIT.
This might not be as much of a homecourt advantage as we were worried about; there might be a lot more WSU fans there than anyone is anticipating. I don't know how many fans there are in the Bay Area, but Moraga is less than a 30 minute drive from both Oakland and San Francisco.

If you are a Coug fan in the Bay Area, please, for the love of everything that is good and right, pony up $15 and get yourself into that gym.

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This is kinda ridiculous.

This is where per game statistics go to die.

CougCenter

by Craig Powers on Mar 17, 2009 12:06 PM PDT reply actions

It's good for us

I hope there are some cougs down there.

by peaty411s on Mar 17, 2009 12:19 PM PDT up reply actions

Guys, I wouldn’t read too much into it. $75 bucks for NIT tickets is expensive (even if second row is awesome), and they are playing Washington State.

At the same time, they would have fun watching Klay Thompson and Taylor Rochestie blow them away from downtown.. but they can do that for free from the bar, right?

Economics might have a lot to do with this. The Pac-10 Championship game at the Staples Center was only half-full, even though USC, the team 5 minutes away, was playing for the title.

House Of Sparky: An Arizona State Sun Devils blog

by Cory Williams on Mar 17, 2009 12:26 PM PDT reply actions

But a $20 or $15 ticket? In a postseason tournament?

If the game was in Pullman — a similar sized city even further removed from a metropolitan area — I guarantee it would draw much more than 3,500, even with the students on spring break. The main point was that there are plenty of really good (and affordable) seats available in a very, very small gym.

CougCenter

by Jeff Nusser on Mar 17, 2009 12:50 PM PDT up reply actions

Reason #1746 to get the Pac-10 tournament out of L.A.

The Pac-10 Championship game at the Staples Center was only half-full, even though USC, the team 5 minutes away, was playing for the title.

by Grady Clapp on Mar 17, 2009 12:59 PM PDT up reply actions

The attendance was over 16,000

Which I’m sure is more than half full.

But I agree, get the tournament out of L.A.!

This is where per game statistics go to die.

CougCenter

by Craig Powers on Mar 17, 2009 1:09 PM PDT up reply actions

Reported attendance and actual attendance are not the same thing ...

CougCenter

by Jeff Nusser on Mar 17, 2009 2:03 PM PDT up reply actions

Yes

I have a feeling many of the “no shows” were UCLA fans who had purchased tickets and decided not to show up. When I went there a few years back, the title game was UCLA-CAL and the place was pretty full.

This is where per game statistics go to die.

CougCenter

by Craig Powers on Mar 17, 2009 2:13 PM PDT up reply actions

Also this just goes to show

Outside of Gonzaga, the WCC fanbase is pretty apathetic. Sure, you see full gyms on the road when the Zags play anybody, but for a run of the mill LMU vs. Pepperdine game? No one.

The WCC’s attendance is driven by love of Gonzaga when they are home, and hatred of Gonzaga on the road. Anything else just doesn’t draw.

by Grady Clapp on Mar 17, 2009 12:57 PM PDT reply actions

Missing conclusion

Nuss-
The conclusion you’re missing is the conclusion Zag fans came to a long time ago: Saint Mary’s is a lot more lame than they say they are.
Beat those idiots.

by LR on Mar 17, 2009 2:58 PM PDT reply actions