Except for Navy.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/college-foo...1535634001
College football has an attendance problem. Average announced attendance in football’s top division dropped for the fourth consecutive year last year, declining 7.6% in four years. But schools’ internal records show that the sport’s attendance woes go far beyond that.
The average count of tickets scanned at home games—the number of fans who actually show up—is about 71% of the attendance you see in a box score, according to data from the 2017 season collected by The Wall Street Journal. In the Mid-American Conference, with less-prominent programs like Central Michigan and Toledo, teams’ scanned attendance numbers were 45% of announced attendance.
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When Arkansas hosted No. 21 Auburn, scanned attendance was more than 25,000 lower than announced attendance. Overall last season,
Arkansas’s scanned home attendance was 58% of its announced attendance as the Razorbacks went 4-8. Nonetheless, Reynolds Razorback Stadium is reopening Saturday after a $160 million renovation that increased capacity by about 4,000. An Arkansas spokesman declined to comment.
Florida State, which won the 2013 national title, last season had a scanned attendance that was 57% of its announced attendance. FSU spokesman Rob Wilson blamed personnel and technical issues in scanning tickets and said, “We do not believe the difference is as large as the data appears to show.”
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Many schools take a generous approach in compiling announced attendance, by including ushers, security guards and even the guy at the concession stand who sells you a Coke. That partly explains how Purdue’s announced attendance last season spiked 13,433 per game—the largest jump in college football.
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Public attendance numbers are part of some schools’ identity.
Michigan Stadium, the “Big House,” whose 107,601 capacity is the nation’s largest, still claims a streak of 100,000-plus attendance games dating back to 1975, even though two games last year showed fewer than 80,000 scanned tickets.
A Michigan spokesman said surges of fans at gates just before kickoff sometimes prompt workers to tear tickets rather than scanning them. Michigan counts the media, stadium workers and marching bands in its announced attendance.
Nebraska boasts a sellout streak that dates to the 1962 season. But during last year’s 4-8 record, there was an average gap of more than 18,000 per game between scanned and announced attendance—mostly no-shows, a spokesman said.
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Free tickets often are counted among attendance figures even if they’re never used. California, on the hook to repay the cost of a $321 million renovation for Memorial Stadium unveiled in 2012, gave away 57,108 tickets last season.
That’s nearly an entire free game at the 62,467-seat stadium. About 35% of the free tickets were used, school officials say.
“Our sales and marketing team continues to look for more creative and unique ways to bring fans to Memorial Stadium,” said Joe Mulford, senior associate athletic director and chief revenue officer.
Not every school pumps up its attendance figures.
Of the nearly 100 football programs that gave data to the Journal, just one used a turnstile count for its announced attendance: Navy.
Said athletic director Chet Gladchuk: “It is just the way we do business.”