USF men's bball, the NCAA Tournament, and the future

[BasketBull2012]

We can now watch the remaining teams in the NCAA Tournament and know that our guys are right there; we be long. And we can certainly see what pieces we are missing to get to the top.

But it's missing pieces and not chunks...

"New" Sun Dome, new facilities, fresh from NCAA Tournament victories, and a highly-touted class coming in, these are huge chunks to the basketball puzzle. Oh, don't forget that we have a pretty good coach: Big East Coach of the Year.

It's funny. I happened to catch Seton Hall play in the NIT on ESPN. I'd never cared to learn anything about them, still don't. Anyway, I caught a glimpse of their home court... It reminded me of the old Tulane area back in the day. Seton Hall averaged 7,937 for this year. How can they get that many people in that place! Anyway, if the Seton Hall Pirates have been as successful as they have over the years and playing in that small environment, I don't see how we can't do well with our new facilities.

For USF basketball junkies like me, this is beyond belief.Wow!

However, these questions remain:

1) Will USF students and fans support the basketball program?

2) Will the Tampa Bay community embrace college basketball?

3) Will the program support itself financially and grow?

This year, both uf and fsu had good seasons and attendance numbers.

But Miami had our attendance numbers.

Florida 10,186

Florida State 9,327

Miami 4,763

Winning brings out the fans, and emotional victories create life-long fans.

[Joe]

Seton Hall plays at the Devils arena. They played their NIT game at that gym because it cost too much money to rent the Prudential Center for a NIT game that would draw 2-3,000 people.

I wouldn't call the Sundome a small environment. It's pretty big for an on campus arena.

[SRQ]

Bulls will have their chances to win new fans in 2012-13. Big names will come to dome and if USF wins most of those games, tampa bay will climb on board

[Brad]

When I was there, it would take a hell of a lot of good wins (which we seldom got) to get anyone there. Or have the Gators and Seminoles in town. I really hope the area AND CAMPUS responds to the team's run and the new facilities and gets their butts there.

[Triple B]

However, these questions remain:

1) Will USF students and fans support the basketball program in non-embarrassing numbers?

Quantified that ... and we'll have to wait and see for the answer ... Really won't know for, at least, a couple of years.

2) Will the Tampa Bay community embrace college basketball?

See 1).

3) Will the program support itself financially and grow?

Not sure what exactly that means ...

Miami 4,763

Had no idea UM drew that poorly down there ...

[Triple B]

Seton Hall plays at the Devils arena.

Didn't realize we weren't the only ones playing in a hockey arena this year ...

I wouldn't call the Sundome a small environment. It's pretty big for an on campus arena.

I think what he meant was "if the Seton Hall Pirates have been as successful as they have over the years EVEN playing in that small environment, I don't see how we can't do well with our new facilities".

[NJBull]

Seton hall has not played a league game at Walsh gym in at least 20 years. Played at the meadowlands since 1982 or so then to The Rock the last few years. Used to go see the hall play Ewing and GTown when I was in high school at the Meadowlands.

[CPR]

I'll never understand how a school with over 40k students can't regularly get 5k to actually show up every game and support their team that plays in the best conference in America.

[Dogma]

I think people are overthinking the attendance issue

Our attendance suck because we have been perennial bottomfeeders. Plain and simple.

You can fault students for not showing up... but your talking about a school with very limited history, and a good majority of that history is horrible.

Win and people will come. Plain and simple

Everyone saw how our attendance this year grew at the end when when team was actually competitive... even while playing all the way downtown.

You can't fault student attendance for it. Some here might.. but working at USF, I know how lots of students have VERY limited funds and transportation options.

...Any proponent of OCS gives this as the the #1 or 2 reason.

Last time we were competitive, with DoJo, I dont know how many people here went to the games at the end of the season...

At the beginning of that year, attendance was the same miserable size. I remember having no problem sitting in the 3 row mid court

By the end of the season... I had to get season the the upper level.

The season attendance that year was 78,144, up from 58,628 the year before.

We lost momentum after when DOJo announce he was going to leave, and then we started the season horribly.

Just keep being competitive and attendance goes up.

[TrujilloBull2013]

the key to getting Tampa Bay on board with our re\/enue sports- basketball AND football- is consistency. we ha\/e to be competiti\/e on a regular basis so that we can build on the new fans we gain with succesful seasons like the one our BB team just had. a good season scattered in between two or three mediocre to bad seasons loses a lot of those fans. regular, consistent success and national attention that comes with it won't gi\/e casual fans a chance to fall off the bandwagon. something to cheer about for a successi\/e string of seasons is the next step for us.