GridironGus
Well-known member
- Joined
- Sep 10, 2018
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https://www.twincities.com/2019/09/14/shipley-gophers-crowd-a-few-oars-short/
"Eleven years after opening TCF Bank Stadium on the east edge of campus, and a couple of years after opening its $166 million Athletes Village, Gophers football still has an attendance problem. It was as clear Saturday as the easy deciphered “MINNESOTA” written in gold seats in the north upper deck. Official attendance for Saturday’s 35-32 victory over Georgia Southern was 41,021, about 9,000 below capacity. But before you wonder who is going to pony up to watch the Gophers play Georgia Southern, consider that 97,420 watched LSU beat the Southern Eagles 55-3 on Aug. 31 in Baton Rouge, La."
You cannot compare Minnesota to LSU. Baton Rouge (and the 1 hour away New Orleans) does not have a first place major league baseball team or a NHL or MLS team competing for sports dollars along with other non-sports events. NFL football is over an hour away, not 5 minutes away. Minnesota hasn't been a consistent winner in decades. If Fleck gets them to the winning level that Wisconsin has been at for 20 years then there will be talk of expanding the stadium. But anyone who waited in line to get in to the stadium yesterday would agree that there were A LOT of people there yesterday. And why concentrate on people that aren't there? How about the fact that there were 40,000 of us there cheering on the
Gophers? Isn't that MORE than the Twins have seen for any game this year? Isn't that more than any Wild and Timberwolves games combined? I do agree with those that wrote about how the TV timeouts have lengthened the games too much. But if you are attending the game with people you enjoy spending time with, shouldn't that be an enjoyable interlude?
"Eleven years after opening TCF Bank Stadium on the east edge of campus, and a couple of years after opening its $166 million Athletes Village, Gophers football still has an attendance problem. It was as clear Saturday as the easy deciphered “MINNESOTA” written in gold seats in the north upper deck. Official attendance for Saturday’s 35-32 victory over Georgia Southern was 41,021, about 9,000 below capacity. But before you wonder who is going to pony up to watch the Gophers play Georgia Southern, consider that 97,420 watched LSU beat the Southern Eagles 55-3 on Aug. 31 in Baton Rouge, La."
You cannot compare Minnesota to LSU. Baton Rouge (and the 1 hour away New Orleans) does not have a first place major league baseball team or a NHL or MLS team competing for sports dollars along with other non-sports events. NFL football is over an hour away, not 5 minutes away. Minnesota hasn't been a consistent winner in decades. If Fleck gets them to the winning level that Wisconsin has been at for 20 years then there will be talk of expanding the stadium. But anyone who waited in line to get in to the stadium yesterday would agree that there were A LOT of people there yesterday. And why concentrate on people that aren't there? How about the fact that there were 40,000 of us there cheering on the
Gophers? Isn't that MORE than the Twins have seen for any game this year? Isn't that more than any Wild and Timberwolves games combined? I do agree with those that wrote about how the TV timeouts have lengthened the games too much. But if you are attending the game with people you enjoy spending time with, shouldn't that be an enjoyable interlude?