Suggestion Box on how to boost Student Attendance & Enthusiasm at Games

[Billy Co]

Student attendance has noticeably been down the last few seasons and I'm taking suggestions and recommendations on how the student section leaders as well as the athletics department should go about resolving the problem. ANY outside the box thinking would be appreciated. Is there something students should do? Is there steps the Athletics Department should be taking the boost student attendance? Feedback would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

[valpo4life]

I have not been able to attend a game this year, but is the music selection during timeouts, etc still horrendous? I remember times where the opposing team would have to call a timeout due to us making a run and the first thing you hear is the slow intro to Sweet Caroline. Music was a buzzkill.

Also if students are still allowed in for free, they should be required to sit in the student section. If that gets full then they can overflow to another designated section. If a student wants to sit elsewhere make them buy a ticket for that seat. There are many times at games in the past where students and athletes would sit in section A or AA. Athletes at Valpo seem to rarely ever in the student section, it almost seems like they think they are too cool to cheer.

[vuny98]

When I was a student there, only sat in student section once or twice. Preferred to stand around the outer edge. Agree, making them sit in the section is a good thought, but hard to control, especially with so many seats open in the upper section.

Moving the band from the student section may help too... Its really load sitting next to that for a whole game, and most students would prefer to have a conversation with friends during a time out rather than have music blasting in their ear.

And this is a generalization and assumption... but the typical college student at Valpo is not very interested in sports. So you need to get already set groups of students an incentive to go to the game (i.e frats/sororities, other sports teams, choir, robotics clubs, intermurals, etc.). "Force" them to go, get them involved and interested and start rebuilding the culture of Valpo sports pride in the student body that used to be there.

Lastly, better games earlier in the year at home and game on Friday/Saturday nights. Can't expect a Sunday afternoon game or a Wednesday night to have great attendance at Valpo.

[crusader05]

To build on Vuny, Coordination with fraternities and sororities by maybe letting them do fundraising for their specific philantrophies at the game: for example a couple groups have literacy causes: maybe having people bring a book and those groups come to attend/participate in half time events.

Another thing that changed that happened before Bryce left: the team needs to be more engaged in student population. They used to rush into the student section after each game, they did promos around campus and just generally were well liked by the community. We are a small enough campus that this could pull people to feel more connected.

[vu72]

It will be a difficult task and the primary reason is that today's kids are not very social.  They will text each other when someone is in the next room.  Going to a game is social and primarily students would rather stay home and play games on their phones.  If I had it to do all over again I would be much more involved in all the great stuff going on at a University like Valpo, not just sports, and my guess is that in 20 or 30 years today's students might wish they used their time differently.

Having said all that, I would think one thing that might help is for Coach Lottich, together with different players, could be seen regularly at the Union, promoting Valpo Basketball. Fans can think players as "untouchable" or too out of ones league to communicate with them.  This inter-action can help bridge that gap.

Then again, free food is always a winner and Homer would regularly buy pizza for the students.

[VU2014]

100% agree with vuny98. They need to revive Valpo Sports Pride and start rebuilding the culture.

A few ideas:
-Restore the VU CRU (student group that led the student section) and get funding from the student senate for T-Shirts, Food, Events Etc. Recruit people to this organization every year.
-Designate 1 person as the leader of each dorm to knock on dorms and rally that dorm to the ARC for games. Also have 1 leader from each fraternity/sorority. Have them bang on doors and tell RAs to get people down to the game.
-At the opening Convocation for Freshman take all the freshman down to the ARC and introduce them to the Team & Coaches. Teach them the cheers and explain to them the history of Valpo Basketball. And relay to them its an expectation to come to the games. Indoctrinate them to the culture. Other schools do this and there is no reason Valpo's Athletics Department could set this up. It wouldn't be hard that first day. UNI does this.
https://twitter.com/CoachJake_UNI/status/898215047754727426
https://twitter.com/CoachJake_UNI/status/898219162555863041

-Valpo Athletics should invested in enhancing the gameday experience.
-Valpo Athletics should reach out to the Music Department and ask them to help the pep band. Ask them to recruit students. Maybe offer a half credit for being in the pep band.
-Create a text alert. Example during Convocation have everyone text a number and it will send reminders to the students phone of when the games are. Also have them follow the Valpo Athletics & basketball social media accounts.
-Get the Coaches to hang out in the Student Union once a week during lunch and just connect with the students.
-Have the Athletics Department work with the Greek Life Department and strongly urge them to not allow Greek Recruitment events on the same day as games. All greek life recruitment have to be registered through the Greek Life department anyways. Work together to maximize results.

[VUGrad1314]

That approachable nature was a hallmark of past teams. Ryan Broekhoff Vashil Fernandez Jubril Adekoya Lexus Williams Bobby Capobianco  etc. always seemed both from my own personal experience with them and from my friends who knew them better to have a smile and a moment to chat with their fellow students. Never once did I get the sense that they were too good or too cool to talk to people. They were just all around solid people. I'm sure there were and are many like them but those players stood out in particular. I'd love to see that tradition continue. Maybe stage some meet the team nights before the season starts or find other avenues for the athletes and other students to interact. (Maybe this is where my idea of seeing greater partnership between the Office of International Programs/Gandhi-King Center and the athletic department could work well (more on that later)

As for student engagement I would say making student attendance of all athletic events (not just basketball) a point of emphasis from orientation onwards and getting the RAs involved to make sure students are  encouraged to attend events is a good idea. Maybe partner with the Office of International Programs/Gandhi-King center which is always doing international outreach events to stoke interest in Valpo Athletics by having an International Student Appreciation Day to teach about American sports and let them see their importance to our culture or even combining the international food/market days or culture nights with athletic events somehow.

Do the concessions stands accept the One card/Crusader Cash? If not they should.

I don't know maybe these ideas aren't feasible but I'm just spitballing.

[vu72]

I really like the Northern Iowa idea but...they have 10,000 undergrads and a city population of 41,500.  Their average attendance is 4321 over four home games.  That is 8.4% of the combined students and residents.  Valpo has 3,300 undergrads and a city population of 33,000.  Our average attendance has been 3039 over our first four so that is 8.4% of our combined number.

We have the exact same result when taking into account the stats I showed.   Both suck and are due in part to bad play from both teams. We are 11-10 and they are 10-10.

[VUGrad1314]

I also want to say that for as critical as we may sound/be sometimes many of us I'm sure are plenty grateful for what we have in terms of the program leadership and Conference quality (especially now). Valpo has done very well for itself since the late 80s early 90s It's just that we believe as I'm sure everyone does that we can still be so much more. I'm glad to see threads like this that show that that commitment isn't limited to just us fans.

[VU2014]

An organized student group could once again put together events like this. This was just 4 short years ago when the student section was much more organized. I really think the Athletics Department should encourage and give resources to boost enthusiasm and restore some pride.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-STAL0aNko

[elephtheria47]

Attendance for sporting events is decreasing everywhere. It's just too easy, and cheaper, to stay at home on your couch and watch it on HDTV.

I'm not sure you can emphasize sports, or basketball, without a potential negative reaction. If it's true that current students don't care about the athletic events, I can just imagine reactions if they are consistently reminded, texted, pound on doors, etc about the games. Also curious is the reactions of students involved in other university activities that would not get the full court press.

It comes down to 2 things. The first is a consistent winner. mbb is struggling this year. The second thing is you have to make "being there" worth the person's time and investment (which #1 helps).  I feel this is where the gameday experience is falling short. Generally, there are more ways to incentivize the student population rather than the general surrounding population so I think that's where it needs to start. General population will bandwagon if/when a team is winning and getting publicity.

[valpo64]

Like the VU CRU/t shirt thing...maybe the Ath. Dept help in cost...that alone helps create interest and enthusiasm when the rest of the crowd notices student section, especially when they are being active, having fun.  We always notice more crowd involvement and good atmosphere when the student section is having fun and being active...theme nights?  Love it when they get into crazy outfit thing...maybe student competition(frats, sororities, dorms) for new and unique cheers.  Having the cheer leaders lead Student cheers in front of their section.  Allow students to use their ID's for discounted food and drink .  Oh yes, and a consistently winning team helps .Let's face it  we are bound to have a down year now and then.  As the team grows and matures maybe they will appreciate more student involvement and react accordingly after the games by interacting with the students.

[VUCPB alum]

Personally I feel that it would be worth while to get the academic departments involved. What I mean would be this, Valpo has a Statistics department, maybe try to have a collaboration where the Stats students and Professors collect game statistics and maybe have the upper level Stats students run in depth analysis and try to find trends as to when the team is good or bad in some areas. Collaborate with the Marketing Students and Professors and have them do ad campaigning. If the right people are involved virtually every department on could find some way to collaborate

[wh]

I have not been able to attend a game this year, but is the music selection during timeouts, etc still horrendous? I remember times where the opposing team would have to call a timeout due to us making a run and the first thing you hear is the slow intro to Sweet Caroline. Music was a buzzkill.

Also if students are still allowed in for free, they should be required to sit in the student section. If that gets full then they can overflow to another designated section. If a student wants to sit elsewhere make them buy a ticket for that seat. There are many times at games in the past where students and athletes would sit in section A or AA. Athletes at Valpo seem to rarely ever in the student section, it almost seems like they think they are too cool to cheer.

I noticed a few students (girls as well as guys) sitting in Section D on Sunday. Maybe they like a 30 yard line view better than an end zone view, who knows? Part of me says they should have sat in the student section, yet another part says at least they made the effort to attend, unlike 95% (pick a number) of their peers.

[bigmosmithfan1]

The one thing I will say in defense of some students sitting elsewhere: those seats down low right behind the basket standard are *terrible* (as in your view of the lane is completely obstructed as well as a portion of the entire court). If it's a TV game, you'll see guys sitting there because it's easier to get on camera, but for other games, heck, I'd pick other seats if they were available.

[a3uge]

Beer.

[truth219]

honestly beer would bring people in

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G890A using Tapatalk

[VU2014]

Beer.

honestly beer would bring people in

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G890A using Tapatalk

I'm for this idea. It would boost general admission. It could be done if the University went through a 2nd party with a liquor license. I'm not optimistic the University would go for it.

[crusadermoe]

Easy answer: have a beer or two before the game if you are 21.

Usually  fan turnout goes down in relation to team performance.  That's normal.  But many of my posts last year (and the one prior) cited the same pathetic student turnout when the team was excellent and we had a popular future NBA player on the court.

Part of following the team as alumni is to share the excitement for the team with current students.   I'm just not getting that vibe at all.   I am honestly thinking I will just ignore this team until I hear the students are attending again.  How many games do Heckler and top adminstrators attend?  Any comment on that?

It pains me to say out, but I honestly think the student culture at Valpo has changed dramatically from kids who enjoy events to kids who hibernate more frequently than ever  to read practice an instrument, or play around on their smartphones.  For them, crowd noise just makes it harder to hear Netflix on your headphones.  Why not just check scores or flip to ESPN3 every so often.   The "event" buzz just doesn't move them.

[truth219]

Easy answer: have a beer or two before the game if you are 21.

Usually  fan turnout goes down in relation to team performance.  That's normal.  But many of my posts last year (and the one prior) cited the same pathetic student turnout when the team was excellent and we had a popular future NBA player on the court.

Part of following the team as alumni is to share the excitement for the team with current students.   I'm just not getting that vibe at all.   I am honestly thinking I will just ignore this team until I hear the students are attending again.  How many games do Heckler and top adminstrators attend?  Any comment on that?

It pains me to say out, but I honestly think the student culture at Valpo has changed dramatically from kids who enjoy events to kids who hibernate more frequently than ever  to read practice an instrument, or play around on their smartphones.  For them, crowd noise just makes it harder to hear Netflix on your headphones.  Why not just check scores or flip to ESPN3 every so often.   The "event" buzz just doesn't move them.

the point was to have people come to the game to have a few beers. I am not an alcoholic but it would get people to come.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G890A using Tapatalk

[talksalot]

I'll throw out props to the Phi Delts... they had a decent showing in the Student Section last night... too bad all of the seats around them were filled with air.

[vu84v2]

This is a very thoughtful and intelligent thread. Let me offer a few ideas that hopefully reach the level of some of the other suggestions.

-Move the MVC games that are in the last week in December to the first week in December. There is no rule that says you have to group all of the conference games together and at least one conference (Big Ten) is doing this. While I recognize this would need to be approved by the conference (and probably done by every school), this adds a meaningful conference game when school is in session for all teams.
-Eliminate non-D1 games at the beginning of the season. There is no fan excitement generated by starting the season with one or two non-D1 games.
-While I recognize that winning is a major cause of building a personal relationship with a team, I wonder if something might be lacking with this team right now. It might not be a fair example, but one thing that struck me about the Florida State, Saint Mary's and Rhode Island games was that the students really seemed to be connected to the team. My suggestion is that there probably needs to be some additional emphasis here and that token actions need to be avoided. What I am suggesting is more personal interaction between the players and the students (and maybe the community) by doing such things as: players having Twitter accounts that students can follow (would need to be monitored by the athletic department), players having meals together in places where students and fans go (i.e. Union, restaurants in town, etc.) and (as stated previously) having the coaches and players involved in orientation programs when Freshmen start classes.

[vu84v2]

honestly beer would bring people in

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G890A using Tapatalk

While I am not against selling beer at Valpo games, I am not so sure this would do anything for student attendance and enthusiasm. I go to most games for a D1 team that does have beer sold at games and I seldom see students buying out holding a beer.

[M]

I've heard there is only one staff member in charge of gameday stuff. If that's true, they need some more help.

[NativeCheesehead]

That's crazy. When I was working at the ticket office my senior year there were 3.