I am pleased to welcome Mr. Kendrick Marshall to the HBCU Sports Blog. KM will be contributing analysis and columns on a regular basis, so please feel free to leave your feedback on his work.
While black college sports are widely known for stadium-rocking marching bands and intense clashes on the gridiron, the atmosphere is not so lively once the grass is replaced with hardwood floors. With the recent release of the latest men’s basketball attendance figures, many athletic directors at historically black colleges and universities must be asking themselves what will it take to increase interest in a sport that is a cash cow for mid-major programs throughout the NCAA.
Southern University is annually among the national leaders in home attendance for football games, but draws fewer than 950 fans regularly for home basketball games. Reigning MEAC conference champion Coppin State draws a hair over 500 patrons, and some programs in the SIAC and CIAA barely tip the scales in fan numbers at all.
The numbers are slightly better for schools like Jackson State University (2,586), Elizabeth City State University (2,664), Morgan State University (2,396) and Morehouse College (2,756). But is that really improvement compared to our BCS brothers who get that many fans three hours before opening tip?
Where is the disconnect? The teams are on the court, but it seems like there are few loyal fans in the stands to cheer on our beloved hoop squads.
Some have said the scheduling of home games during the afternoon hours on the weekend is hurting attendance. Others attribute the low numbers to the tough pay-for-play road trips programs take to start the season. Traveling across the country with few home games in between kills what little interest could have been present for conference games.
Sure, schools could do better in promoting basketball programs to encourage more fan support. A flashy intermission show complete with scantily-clad cheerleaders would not hurt, but that is not what represents the ideal college basketball atmosphere. Athletic directors shouldn’t have to resort to marketing gimmicks just to draw a 1,000 fans to a black college basketball game when it does not take half the effort to attract Joe and Sally football fan to a black college football classic or homecoming game.
There is no excuse for fans to not attend home basketball games. If fans can travel hundreds of miles to a football game in some expensive big city and fill the stadium with 60,000 people, a quarter of those same patrons should be able to hop a ride to the campus gym and support the basketball team.
