It’s the new craze sweeping college football and the media across the country… “TCU has no support” or “TCU is #6 and can’t fill its own stadium.” We get it, it’s played out. No longer can media outlets like Versus, ESPN, Fox Sports, etc…put TCU down for the teams they play or how they perform on the field. They now have to switch it up to the attendance argument. I guess I will have to break it down for them myself.
First, I would like to point out what should be the obvious. That is TCU’s school size compared to the others. Let’s start with how TCU measures up to other Universities in the Top 10 of the BCS in regard to number of students. Keep in mind TCU is a private University compared to the others which are public schools besides USC.
Florida- 49,679
Alabama- 28,807
Texas- 49,984
Iowa- 30,409
USC- 33,389
TCU- 8,696
Boise State- 18,829
Cincinnati- 39,667
It seems to me like there is quite a large difference there between TCU and the rest of the schools. Boise State is the closest and they still have 10,000 more students than TCU. Now, let’s compare TCU to a few other private Universities.
TCU- 8,696
Baylor- 13,886
Miami- 15,449
Stanford- 14,995
Duke- 13,457
Small sample there, but do you see the trend developing here? TCU is by far the smallest school currently in the Top 25 of the BCS Rankings.
Now, I would like to take the average home attendance and the size of their stadiums in to account. We all know the likes of Florida, Texas, and Alabama play in huge stadiums and fill them up, so we will skip them, but let’s take a look at some others real quick.
TCU
Home: Amon G. Carter Stadium
Capacity: 44,008
TCU Average Home Attendance over last 2 ½ seasons (2007-current): 31,094 (# of games=16)
TCU Average Home Attendance this season through 4 games: 34,269
Cincinnati
Home: Nippert Stadium
Capacity: 35,098
Cincinnati Average Home Attendance over last 2 ½ seasons (2007-current): 31,443(# of games= 15)
Cincinnati Average Home Attendance this season through 3 games: 32,810
Hmmm…isn’t this just interesting. TCU is out drawing Cincinnati this season but nobody on TV is talking about how Cincinnati gets no support, or how they can’t draw fans. I even went back and subtracted the UNLV game from TCU and redid their average with 3 games and they still outdrew the Bearcats by 2,000 fans. I wonder why nobody brings up Cincinnati’s fan base? Two reasons…1. They are in the BCS 2. Nippert Stadium is almost 9,000 seats smaller than Amon G. Carter so it looks like it is more filled than it is. SHOCKING! Why aren’t their fans supporting the #8 team in the country????
BOISESTATE
Home: Bronco Stadium
Capacity: BroncoSports.com says capacity is 32,000, Wikipedia says 33,500
Boise State Average Home Attendance over last 2 ½ seasons (2007-current): 31,549 (# of games= 17)
Boise State Average Home Attendance this season through 4 games: 32,625
Uh oh! What do we have here? Do you actually mean the media darlings of Boise State average fewer fans than TCU this season? What are the TV networks going to do now? What’s even funnier is that Boise State drew 34,127 fans for their big time matchup with Oregon. TCU had more fans than that at Amon Carter for Texas State and SMU. AHAHAHA. All I can do is laugh right now. But we all know Boise State has a solid fan base but TCU doesn’t…(insert more laughing here)
MIAMI
Home: Dolphins Stadium
Capacity: 76,500
Miami Average Home Attendance over last 2 ½ seasons (2007-current): 45,991 (# of games =17)
Miami Average Home Attendance this season through 4 games: 49,691
It looks like Miami does pretty good for itself attendance wise. But, they only average 49,691 this season and the stadium holds 76,000. The Hurricanes obviously must not have a strong fan base if they can’t sell out the stadium week in and week out right?
BAYLOR
Home: Floyd Casey Stadium
Capacity: 50,000
Baylor Average Home Attendance over last 2 ½ seasons (2007-current): 34,364 (# of games= 18)
Baylor Average Home Attendance this season through 5 games: 34,693
I just wanted to throw Baylor up here for a few select people to see. Plus, I feel bad for Baylor fans. It looks like Baylor is only out drawing TCU by about 400 fans this season. Not bad, TCU would do a lot better if it got attendance bumps from Texas and those other Big XII teams coming to town to help you out. Plus, I would just like to add that there is nothing to do in Waco.
If you want to decide who plays in the BCS Bowls based on attendance and fan bases, then go right ahead. It wouldn’t surprise me since the system is crooked and biased anyways. If you want to settle it the right way, then you should watch the product on the field and not how many fans are in the stands. TCU has shown this season that they can play with anyone in the country and it is ridiculous that all these media outlets want to do is throw dirt on them and bring up attendance rather than what is shown on the field.
All of the numbers in this post show and prove that TCU’s fan base and attendance is no smaller than the likes of Cincinnati and Boise State. It is probably larger if you look at attendance to students ratio. I am not sitting here saying it’s great and doesn’t need improvement, but maybe, just maybe the talking heads of the media will actually read this or do research for themselves before they start spewing incorrect assumptions out of their mouths.
