Hockey no more popular now than last year

[ebilmes]

I know "the polls don't matter," but...

Last April I posted the results of a campus poll conducted by the Cornell Progressive which found that hockey was the most popular men's varsity sport.

http://elf.elynah.com/read.php?7,130731,130731#msg-130731

Which Cornell men's varsity sport is your favorite to watch?

Hockey         37%
Basketball     18
Lacrosse       6
Football       6

Other          7
None           26

+/- 5.3%, N=348, 3/27-30

Our new poll finds almost identical results:

Which Cornell men's varsity sport is your favorite to watch?  

Hockey        38%
Basketball    16
Football      5
Lacrosse      4

Other         6
None          31

± 4.3%, N=494, 1/15-19

Despite a stronger hockey season, there has been no significant increase in popularity for the team.

[ugarte]

CornellFan silently weeps...

[Josh '99]

Can you realistically expect hockey to get much more of a "market share" than it already has?  I mean, 38% of the undergrad population is more than enough to fill Lynah (all of it, not just the student section).

[Trotsky]

Nothing has significantly changed over the span of the past year.  it would be great if they continued taking the poll every year, same time, with good methodology, and we could see the results ebb and flow with losing, championships, etc.  It would be interesting to have the breakdown from, say, 1969.

The "favorite" metric is a problem, though.  It would be much better to ask individually "how closely do you follow" a given sport.  That way, if, say, both hockey and football were very popular among the same people, it would not be artificially portrayed as zero sum.

[mnagowski]

How do you know that CornellFan didn't stuff the ballot box?

[hypotenuse]

As someone who was on campus 1969-73, I doubt the poll results would have been much different then, at least as to hockey. Football, with Ed Marinaro, would have been second, with Richie Moran's lacrosse team. Basketball would have been subsumed in"other". On the other hand, if "hatred of Nixon" had been a varsity sport, it might have challenged hockey.

[Trotsky]

[quote hypotenuse]if "hatred of Nixon" had been a varsity sport[/quote]

Columbia might have finally been okay at something.

[David Harding]

[quote hypotenuse]As someone who was on campus 1969-73, I doubt the poll results would have been much different then, at least as to hockey. Football, with Ed Marinaro, would have been second, with Richie Moran's lacrosse team. Basketball would have been subsumed in"other". On the other hand, if "hatred of Nixon" had been a varsity sport, it might have challenged hockey.[/quote]Having enrolled in 1968, I developed the impression that "taking over buildings" ranked high on the list of sports.

[ugarte]

[quote David Harding]Having enrolled in 1968, I developed the impression that "taking over buildings" ranked high on the list of sports.[/quote]
Our taking over buildings teams have sucked for decades. I thought that getting some of the stars of the team to be University trustees would spark interest in revitalizing the program but no dice.

[Willy '06]

Maybe if we restart the taking over buildings team, there won't be an issue  about the F-word at Lynah anymore.

[French Rage]

[quote ugarte][quote David Harding]Having enrolled in 1968, I developed the impression that "taking over buildings" ranked high on the list of sports.[/quote]
Our taking over buildings teams have sucked for decades. I thought that getting some of the stars of the team to be University trustees would spark interest in revitalizing the program but no dice.[/quote]

They tried to restart the team in 2004 but it members came off as whiney and douchey.

[dbilmes]

It's too bad that lacrosse doesn't get more student support. Back in the glory days of the '70s, it would have been right up there with hockey.

[Josh '99]

[quote Willy '06]Maybe if we restart the taking over buildings team, there won't be an issue  about the F-word at Lynah anymore.[/quote]Maybe you could organize a group to take over Teagle and demand that Andy be fired?  :-D

[Swampy]

[quote hypotenuse]As someone who was on campus 1969-73, I doubt the poll results would have been much different then, at least as to hockey. Football, with Ed Marinaro, would have been second, with Richie Moran's lacrosse team. Basketball would have been subsumed in"other". On the other hand, if "hatred of Nixon" had been a varsity sport, it might have challenged hockey.[/quote]

Sort of like "hatred of Bush" today, huh?

[mnagowski]

They tried to restart the team in 2004 but it members came off as whiney and douchey.

The spring of 2005 was a pretty exciting time to be on campus. A disco ball on top of the clock tower, a trip to the NCAAs, a hilarious and petty takeover of Day Hall, and a sudden resignation of the President.