In the wake of a five-game losing streak and a 13-15 record, the Northwestern Athletic Department is attempting to maintain student attendance at men’s basketball games with free merchandise and monetary incentives for groups and philanthropies.
At Wednesday’s face-off against Wisconsin, the Athletic Department sponsored Social Media Night to bolster student attendance. Students who attended the game and registered their Twitter accounts with the Athletic Department received customized T-shirts with their Twitter handles printed on the back.
Shawn Sullivan, NU Athletics’ director of sales and marketing, noted a decent student turnout and increased following on the team’s social networking accounts. But many students still cleared out of Wednesday’s game before the final buzzer as the Cats suffered a crushing 69-41 loss.
One of the students filing out early was Weinberg sophomore Alex Frankenthal, who said she thought attempts like Social Media night were good, but need to be better publicized. She said she did not even know the event was happening when she went to the game.
“It seemed like the normal crowd,” Frankenthal said. “They can only do so much.”
The initiative is one of many attempts by the Athletic Department to prevent a falloff in student attendance during what has proved to be a trying season for the Wildcats. Although Sullivan said he would not have exact numbers on the attendance difference between the seasons, he said there has been a “disappointing” difference between this year and last year, when the Wildcats had a 19-14 record.
In addition to Social Media Night, the Athletic Department is trying different incentives to bring students to the Welsh-Ryan Arena. Sullivan said at the games they have given away free T-shirts and signs that provide students a discount at Buffalo Wild Wings. They have also have had Dance Marathon and Greek nights, at which Sullivan said groups with the largest attendance won a cash prize that was donated to their team or philanthropy.
“We’re trying to find different incentives that will make students hopefully want to bear the weather and hop on that shuttle bus to the arena,” Sullivan said.
Sullivan said the Athletic Department has reached out to students primarily through Wildside, a group of students that promotes support for Northwestern athletics.
SESP sophomore Gram Bowsher serves as president of Wildside and said this quarter, the organization has found it more effective to focus on particular student organizations and partner with them to increase attendance. For example, he said they hosted a night for residential colleges where Wildside provided “munchies” for the college with the highest attendance.
Bowsher pointed to a particularly successful showing when they hosted International Student Association night.
“It’s important to just get different people to a game,” Bowsher said. “We think attendance is better because we’re doing these things.”
To his knowledge, Sullivan said NU is the only school in the Big Ten that provides free admission for students to men’s basketball games. He said he does not know why the attendance at NU does not compare to other schools in the Big Ten with that advantage.
Sullivan said he thought that because students don’t actually have to purchase a ticket, they may not have an incentive to go. He said he didn’t think NU’s rigorous academic culture contributed to the decrease in attendance at games this year, as the demands in the classroom have remained the same.
“No one was blaming academics when we had record student attendance last season,” Sullivan said.
Sullivan said overall, colleges across the country are seeing a decline in attendance due to technological advances, which allow students to access game updates on mobile devices and TV.
“It’s easier to catch your game in the warmth of your residence hall,” Sullivan said.
Despite that convenience, Sullivan said he hopes the attendance incentives will work for the last home games of the season.
“Hopefully we can support our seniors with boisterous student sections,” Sullivan said.
