(09-28-2020 01:59 PM)Dukester Wrote: (09-28-2020 01:22 PM)jmufan2008 Wrote: If this (https://www.fueledbysports.com/largest-c...-arenas/3/) is accurate, that would put us around #135 in the nation. Not great, but honestly, I'd rather have a really nice arena that packs in people with the best quality seats, views, and amenities rather than building it too big. If we ever get to the point that we sell out over half of our games than I'll gladly eat my words. Hell, we had people on here saying 8,500 was too big and they were foolish to put in that many seats, so...whatever.
I would not want it more than 8,500. If I had to move it one way by 1,000 seats it would be down versus - up.
I like a full arena with demand for the seats. The more availability, the less demand.
If I was in a bigger city, I'm want a bigger arena, but 8,500 in H-burg is plenty big.
Now football - I'd be more interested in increasing the size if we moved up. An hour from DC would have a bigger impact on football than basketball.
Yep, JMU built it too big for seating capacity which which is a cardinal sin with construction money. You don’t build a church for Christmas and Easter crowds. Can/will JMU sell out for a game against UVA? Of course. Will they sell out any other games even if the team becomes very strong in 3 or 4 years? No.
College basketball attendance for mid majors requires much less seating capacity than people want to believe and continues to trend down 15% since 2008. Multiply that by the sparsely populated Shenandoah valley and we will see more empty seats than filled seats. Check out some average attendance figures for mid majors in small markets that have been consistently strong teams. This is probably the ceiling in the best of years
Charleston (CAA leader) 4,200
Ball State (MAC leader) 4,400
ODU (CUSA leader) 5,900
Louisiana (Sun Belt leader) 3,700
Bradley (MVC leader) 5,600
Montana (Big Sky leader) 4,000
E Tennessee St (SoCon leader) 5,200
A step up in conference to the A-10 wouldn’t justify it either.
The avg Atlantic 10 attendance = 4,800