The average home attendance at ACC men's basketball games this year through Monday is "tracking 13.5% below the final average from 2006," continuing a trend in which crowds have "fallen in each of the past four seasons," according to Rachel Bachman of the WALL STREET JOURNAL. The “famously raucous" students at Duke "aren't using their full ticket allotment this season,” while attendance at Maryland's Comcast Center “has dropped 24% in six years.” While national TV ratings on ESPN “are steady, and still lead all major conferences, fewer people are attending games.” ACC attendance, including the conference's postseason tournament, since '04 "has dropped by 14%, the largest for any of the six major conferences.” However, ACC Commissioner John Swofford noted that the conference tourney “has the highest average attendance of any in the country.” He added TV viewership “remains strong and we are on more platforms than ever before." Bachman noted there are “certainly some mediocre teams and unproven coaches in the ACC this season that may lack the drawing power of predecessors.” One of the “most chilling explanations for the ACC and its member schools is that the decline is a self-inflicted wound: the result of the ACC's recent expansion.” NCAA stats show the ACC's average attendance “peaked at 11,990 in 2004, the season before Miami and Virginia Tech joined the conference.” While the current crop of ACC coaches “has fine credentials, they're not exactly familiar faces” and to some, they “lack the endearing quirks of their predecessors.” Media consultant Chris Bevilacqua, who helped create the Pac-12 TV-rights deal, “pointed to another general culprit: the affordability of clearer, larger televisions.” He said that the at-home TV experience “is better than ever” (WALL STREET JOURNAL, 2/15).
