he season has now concluded for all A-10 teams. These were the 2023-24 season men's basketball home attendance numbers (per stats from each program's site) reported for the fifteen A-10 schools:

ATLANTIC 10 HOME ATTENDANCE BY AVERAGE
TEAM | GAMES | TOTAL | 2023-24 AVG | 2022-23 AVG | 2021-22 AVG
DAYTON | 15 | 201,105 | 13,407 | 13,407 | 13,407
VCU | 19 | 136,813 | 7,201 | 7,303 | 6,827
RICHMOND | 16 | 93,336 | 5,834 | 6,285 | 6,072
ST LOUIS | 16 | 90,238 | 5,640 | 6,694 | 5,517
URI | 17 | 72,024 | 4,237 | 5,158 | 4,814
ST BONAVENTURE | 15 | 61,146 | 4,076 | 3,764 | 3,974
GEORGE MASON | 17 | 66,669 | 3,922 | 3,584 | 3,558
UMASS | 16 | 55,633 | 3,477 | 3,580 | 2,219
LOYOLA | 17 | 52,686 | 3,099 | 3,373 | 3,266
DAVIDSON | 16 | 47,062 | 2,941 | 3,356 | 3,209
DUQUESNE | 17 | 43,377 | 2,552 | 2,178 | 2,174
ST JOE'S | 17 | 38,319 | 2,254 | 1,504 | 1,579
FORDHAM | 17 | 31,724 | 1,866 | 1,135 | 633
LASALLE | 17 | 28,729 | 1,690 | 1,481 | 1,857
GW | 18 | 29,312 | 1,628 | 1,608 | 1,120
TOTAL | 250 | 1,048,173 | 4,193 | 4,240 | 4,245

And yet, the Joe blows everyone away in terms of environment!

At Gentile, 4500 for the last month of conference games is a lot different than 2000 during winter break in non conference games

Would like these types of lists to also include % of capacity. Big difference when you have 3500 fans in a 4500 seat arena vs 3500 fans in a 10,000 seat arena!

These are the capacities of the bigger A-10 arenas (over 5k) with the average attendance percentages

Dayton UD Arena Capacity 13,407 Average Attendance 13,407 100%
St Louis Chaifetz Arena Capacity 10,600 Average Attendance 5,640 53.2%
GMU Eagle Bank Arena Capacity* 10,000/7,860 Average Attendance 3,922 39.2%/49.8%
UMass Mullins Center Capacity 9,493 Average Attendance 3,477 36.7%
URI Ryan Center Capacity 7,657 Average Attendance 4,237 55.3%
VCU Siegel Arena Capacity 7,637 Average Attendance 7,201 94.3%
Richmond Robins Center Capacity 7,201 Average Attendance 5,834 81.0%

GMU covers upper arena seating sections reducing the number of seats available for basketball games to 7,860. I believe these coverings can be removed for other events such as concerts.

I don't think we need to be so defensive. I love going to games at Gentile but there are other programs in the A10 that clearly have higher levels of fan support. I think Loyola is going in the right direction long term though. We are at ~3k now and when I was a student a decade ago there were MBB games with maybe 10 guys in the student section. The "You let the whole team down" after a missed free throw thing started because one guy was yelling it after missed free throws and the whole arena could hear. If we are still a good program down the road, and once this generation of students is alumni, attendance will probably be much higher. It seems like recent alumni attend games at a much higher rate that older alumni, and I chalk that up to the fan experience they had while they were a student.

Hopefully we are having a conversation about expanding Gentile a few years down the road as a greater % of alumni make going to games a priority.

Not bad for us, considering all things....

Our average for the year would have been much higher had Richmond game not been a bad weather night, and we didn't bother with Goshen, Chicago State, and Central Michigan. But what can you do.....

- More weekend games
- No more D2 / Goshen types of games
- Maybe use Christmas break to prioritize away games instead
- More alumni pregames / postgames / and gameday promotions
- $5 beer nights (I think Duquesne did dollar beer night?)

Depending on where you live, getting to our gym is also not easy most weeknights. Location is everything.

I think one of the biggest culprits in poor Loyola attendance is the season ticket holders. The tickets are too cheap....It is crazy how many people own season tickets who only come to one or two games a year and the rest of the year they go empty. The seats round ours are empty 90% of the time, and they are phenomal seats...I know the guys who own them and they have other seats in the gym or just never bother to come to the games.

The school should either come up with a creative way to incentivize season ticket holders to actually show up or increase the pricing so that only the people who really want to come watch basketball buy the tickets. Of course, I'd rather not pay more but that gym is incredible when it is full. They should reward those who show up to the games with the "first rights" to pick better season tickets than those who leave their seats empty.

I think they should also start putting students sections behind the hoops....they sell out their sections nearly every game...might as well put more kids in the arena if there is a demand.

Lastly - I was at that Richmond game....I'd be amazed if there were even 500 people there....ugly weather and no students. If we had anything resembling a crowd I think we win that game by 10.

I was one of the 500, and you could tell by the listless atmosphere it was going to be a struggle to maintain energy. Crowd also affects ref calls, and we got some of the worst calls of the season in that game.

I also think the tickets could go up in price, but not much. Maybe an NIL surcharge?

Great idea. Raise season ticket prices. Fuck the loyal season ticket holders who spent thousands of dollars, and attended almost every game with their families, through the miserable days of the 90's and first decade and a half of this century.

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Let's go Braden!