ECAC first round playoffs - likely winners

[Trotsky]

[quote billhoward]Cornell is the 1927 Yankees of hockey fandom.[/quote]

Please never, ever use the words Cornell hockey and Yankees in the same sentence again.  Let's say rather that Clarkson is the 2001 Seattle Mariners of hockey fandom.

[RichH]

[quote DeltaOne81]
This isn't to say that I am at all criticizing the NC schools for their attendance this weekend. Distinctly smaller schools and towns, not teams with national at large aspirations really (except maybe SLU but they've mostly lost that by now). I completely understand and also think Bill was wrong.[/quote]

To be fair, Clarkson has always had trouble selling out Cheel for home QF playoff games, going back to the nationally top-5 teams in the '90s who were regularly packing the arena.  There's actually a logical reason for the historically poor QF attendance at Cheel, IMO.  Tech students normally get into home games for free, but come playoff time, the league requires schools to charge a certain $ amount.  While the school covered part of student costs, they couldn't cover it all, and had to charge students for those games.  When poor college students are told that they have to shell out $$ to get something they've been getting for free, you have to expect a lackluster turnout.  Especially when it was a forgone conclusion that Clarkson would be playing weak 7-10 seeds and would make Boston/Lake Placid every year anyway.  IIRC, some of those games were broadcast on closed-circuit campus TV, so a lot of kids sat in the dorms and still could catch all the action.

Schools such as Cornell who charge students for every game don't see that effect, since they expect to pay an admission charge to attend a hockey game.

However, the townie attendance was very strong for those QF weekends.  But now that the Knights aren't as dominant as they were back then, it's natural for the local interest to wane slightly as well.

[Dpperk29]

the free hockey games is what I am looking forward to next year. not that it isn't worth my 15 bucks to sit in lynah, but nothing beats free.

[billhoward]

[quote Trotsky][quote billhoward]Cornell is the 1927 Yankees of hockey fandom.[/quote]
Please never, ever use the words Cornell hockey and Yankees in the same sentence again.  Let's say rather that Clarkson is the 2001 Seattle Mariners of hockey fandom.[/quote]
Hey, I'm a Sox fan myself, but "2004 Sox of hockey fandom" doesn't have the same impact. (If we were, Theo Epstein would probably have us put Cornell's tuition structure on waivers. Up another 5% this year, I see.)

And the analogy to the unbeaten 1972 Dolphins would be the 1970 Big Red team, not the fans. ... and do you know what it's like having my own children growing up as Yankee fans?

[RichH]

[quote billhoward]Pro teams and major colleges that scan each ticket on the way in know attendance instantly.[/quote]

Um, there have also existed devices called "turnstiles."  Too low-tech for you, I know, Bill, but that's how attendances have been counted in the past, and it's a pretty good system.  Even recently, I've seen the Lynah ticket-takers use handheld click-counters.  A much higher degree of error, to be sure.

There was a point 5-8 years ago where MLB teams switched from reporting attendances as a gate-count to reporting attendances as ticket sales.  The ploy was basically so the MLB marketing monkeys could point out to the media/sponsors how the sport had recovered from the 1994 strike and surpassed pre-strike popularity (excluding the periods of labor talks with the Players' Union, when suddenly the owners became bankrupted paupers...when you look at these *other* numbers).  

A fun result of this switch is when the stadium numbers clearly don't match the reported attendance.  I remember a meaningless White Sox or Brewers game on a frigid, storm-riddled, late-September weekday afternoon where the attendance was reported to be 28,000 when there couldn't have been more than 400 people in the place.  Including the players.

[KeithK]

[q]I agree, but Keith said "if Cornell had a first round playoff game during Spring Break I'd be surprised if it did sell out." So, color him surprised, huh? Unless he really meant "1st round" with an inherent prerequesite of us not being in the top 4, but since that was mentioned separately, it took it separately. [/q]I absolutely did mean "first round" as opposed to quarterfinals.  I think there's a difference between support for a top 4 teams with national aspirations and a middle of the pack team who gets a home playoff series simply because the league uses a silly system.  Of course, we don't have any data to support or refute my theory since thankfully Cornell hasn't been below top 4 since the ECAC went to the 12 team playoff system.  My only reference point was the Tuesday night playoff game in 1994, which I'm pretty sure was not a sellout.  That's a poor comparison because that was a Tuesday night game, not a weekend.

Other posters have pointed out the attendance vs. tickets sold issue.  Considering how Cornell handles playoff ticket sales now - including them in the season ticket package preseason - I have to retract or at least modify my initial statement.  Clearly selling most of the tickets months in advance, particularly if hopes for the team were high in October, will make it very likely that QF games over SB would sell out.  Lot's of empty seats though.  I stand by my statement in the hypothetical case of tickets sold the week of the game though.