Lynah Attendance

[The Rancor]

My uncle is a music professor at UCLA, and even before Covid it was hard enough to find the qualified candidates for the orchestras. The gap in learning, combined with continued cuts to arts *and other factors* have made it to where they very nearly could not form an orchestra, band and other ensembles in recent years. That gap destroyed not only top talent, but surely has a trickle down effect to other schools, their pep bands, marching bands etc... combined with apathy, enshitification and piped in music.

(shakes fist at cloud)

[617BigRed]

Sorry if this is discussed upthread, but we are doing theme nights at home this season now?
Kinda sad, but white black and red outs will be cool if there is full crowd for those games...

[andyw2100]

Wow, it used to be a common occurrence in the 1990s. No more.

From the dim recesses of my 80s brain, I saw at least Clarkson, RPI, Vermont, BU, and BC send bands to Lynah, some of them excellent.

Didn't Colgate often send a band? (I could definitely be mistaken.)

[Trotsky]

Wow, it used to be a common occurrence in the 1990s. No more.

From the dim recesses of my 80s brain, I saw at least Clarkson, RPI, Vermont, BU, and BC send bands to Lynah, some of them excellent.

Didn't Colgate often send a band? (I could definitely be mistaken.)

I just do not recall.  I remember I saw the Brown Skating Burger Kings once, but I think it was at Meehan.

[Iceberg]

Clarkson is the only school I can think of that regularly sends a band nowadays. The others don't have the funding or don't bother

[ugarte]

My uncle is a music professor at UCLA, and even before Covid it was hard enough to find the qualified candidates for the orchestras. The gap in learning, combined with continued cuts to arts *and other factors* have made it to where they very nearly could not form an orchestra, band and other ensembles in recent years. That gap destroyed not only top talent, but surely has a trickle down effect to other schools, their pep bands, marching bands etc... combined with apathy, enshitification and piped in music.

(shakes fist at cloud)

maybe they can fill the gap with foreign students

[Trotsky]

For the love of god, don't tell mookie from the Cafe.

[The Rancor]

My uncle is a music professor at UCLA, and even before Covid it was hard enough to find the qualified candidates for the orchestras. The gap in learning, combined with continued cuts to arts *and other factors* have made it to where they very nearly could not form an orchestra, band and other ensembles in recent years. That gap destroyed not only top talent, but surely has a trickle down effect to other schools, their pep bands, marching bands etc... combined with apathy, enshitification and piped in music.

(shakes fist at cloud)

maybe they can fill the gap with foreign students

That's usually what they do... however *other factors*.

[Trotsky]

My uncle is a music professor at UCLA, and even before Covid it was hard enough to find the qualified candidates for the orchestras. The gap in learning, combined with continued cuts to arts *and other factors* have made it to where they very nearly could not form an orchestra, band and other ensembles in recent years. That gap destroyed not only top talent, but surely has a trickle down effect to other schools, their pep bands, marching bands etc... combined with apathy, enshitification and piped in music.

(shakes fist at cloud)

maybe they can fill the gap with foreign students

That's usually what they do... however *other factors*.

Tuesday...

[LGR14]

Not that we shouldn't be able to fill in 4200 seats, but Lynah isn't alone.

https://onwardstate.com/2026/11/03/its-not-just-us-penn-state-footballs-attendance-issue-is-more-of-a-nationwide-issue/

[The Rancor]

Perhaps, on top of price and apathy, the elimination of intramural hockey, and rec skating has really hurt the student attendance. Anecdotal at best, but going for a rec skate and seeing all the banners, probably would spark some curiosity. Maybe Cornell needs a practice rink and to open up Lynah for more student activities.

[RichH]

Wow, it used to be a common occurrence in the 1990s. No more.

From the dim recesses of my 80s brain, I saw at least Clarkson, RPI, Vermont, BU, and BC send bands to Lynah, some of them excellent.

Didn't Colgate often send a band? (I could definitely be mistaken.)

Yes, they did on occasion. Probably not in 15-20 years now. I believe Harvard, Princeton, Yale's bands came once or twice each (playoffs?) and mayyyyybe Dartmouth and/or Brown once? SLU had a weird oboeist who tried to start a pep band there and asked for the CU band's help for a visit. Doubt they ever made it, as they had trouble getting time established at Appleton.

[ugarte]

Perhaps, on top of price and apathy, the elimination of intramural hockey, and rec skating has really hurt the student attendance. Anecdotal at best, but going for a rec skate and seeing all the banners, probably would spark some curiosity. Maybe Cornell needs a practice rink and to open up Lynah for more student activities.

trying to localize the problem to anything this specific when it's clear that there's a generational shift across the country in how college kids spend their time is a fool's errand. The people who would play intramural hockey and skate recreationally are the kids you need to market to the least. it's the warm weather kids with no preexisting hockey exposure the school needs to hook with a hard sell during orientation and a commitment to pricing the games to maximize attendance, not revenue.

[Trotsky]

Perhaps, on top of price and apathy, the elimination of intramural hockey, and rec skating has really hurt the student attendance. Anecdotal at best, but going for a rec skate and seeing all the banners, probably would spark some curiosity. Maybe Cornell needs a practice rink and to open up Lynah for more student activities.

trying to localize the problem to anything this specific when it's clear that there's a generational shift across the country in how college kids spend their time is a fool's errand. The people who would play intramural hockey and skate recreationally are the kids you need to market to the least. it's the warm weather kids with no preexisting hockey exposure the school needs to hook with a hard sell during orientation and a commitment to pricing the games to maximize attendance, not revenue.

Yup, all of this.

Although I would say you do need to do work informing cold weather kids that hockey is the sport at Cornell.  I came from staunch Islanders fandom and had no idea as an incoming student that college hockey existed, let alone that we were a perennial power.  I only learned about it through word of mouth.

We should put a third statue between Ezra and A.D. on the Arts Quad.  Dryden winning the trophy in 1967.

[Jim Hyla]

I asked ChatGPT to compile every home opener we played during Halloween weekend for which attendance data is available:
10/31/03 vs WMU (attendance 3,836)
10/29/04 vs Army (3,836)
10/28/05 vs Michigan State (3,836)
10/26/06 vs Robert Morris (4,004)
10/30/09 vs Niagara (4,267)
10/29/11 vs Mercyhurst (4,267)
10/31/14 vs Omaha (4,004)
10/31/15 vs Niagara (4,267)
10/27/17 vs Alabama-Huntsville (3,277)
10/26/18 vs Michigan State (3,840)
10/29/21 vs Alaska (3,198) [NOTE: COVID-restricted attendance]
10/27/23 vs Minnesota-Duluth (4,316)
10/30/26 vs Sacred Heart (2,754)

Bold: sellout
Italics: Halloween night

Notes: Before the 2006 season, Lynah capacity was expanded from 3,836 to 4,267.
The official box score for 10/27/23 denotes an over-capacity crowd.

As you can see, attendance during Halloween weekend has historically been very high. In particular, games on Halloween night have drawn very well. Last night's attendance sold many fewer tickets than any other Halloween weekend game in recent history. I.e., the fact it took place on Halloween weekend does not provide a satisfactory explanation as to why attendance was terrible. The number of empty seats last night was far worse than the listed attendance, with seemingly over half the rink empty, implying a true attendance of under 2,133. Still, last night looked quite fuller than tonight's attendance. We'll see the official attendance number when it's released, but it seemed that by the time we were midway through the third period, less than 35% of seats were full (attendance of 1,493). Notably, attendance was significantly worse than during the pandemic-era attendance restrictions.

Halloween weekend means nothing. Halloween on Monday has no influence on Friday or Saturday. The only dates that are meaningful are when Halloween is on a Friday or Saturday. So the number of these over the last 15-20 years is really too small to base any results upon.

I know this year I had to make a decision did I stay home and give out candy (I get up to 60-90 kids), or go to the game with my lights off at home, or go to the game and leave a bowl of candy out hoping that someone doesn't just empty the bowl. I chose to leave a bowl and there were still 6 Snickers left when I got home, SUCCESS! But I'm sure some townies stayed home as I would have if I had a small one that I had to take around.

So forget about all those games on a "Halloween weekend" (a term that I've never heard before, probably because it's meaningless). MSU on Friday 10/26/18 means nothing when Halloween is on Wednesday.