■ TEAMS (FIRST SEASON): South Atlantic League Charleston RiverDogs (1980), ECHL South Carolina Stingrays (1993), USL Charleston Battery (1993)
■ VENUES (YEAR OPENED): North Charleston Coliseum (1993, renovated 2014), Joseph P. Riley Jr. Park (1997), MUSC Health Stadium, formerly Blackbaud Stadium (1999)
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The RiverDogs’ family appeal helped Charleston’s three minor league teams top 500,000 in overall attendance.
Photo by: CHARLESTON RIVERDOGS
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Near-record attendance and continued venue upgrades boosted Charleston to its second appearance on our top 10 in the survey’s history, following a No. 7 ranking in 2011.
The market’s three clubs combined to generate a 16 percent increase in total attendance over the past five seasons, nearly doubling the market’s 8.5 percent population growth (the highest rate of population growth among our top 25 markets) during that same span.
Three consecutive years of increases culminated with an overall total attendance of 518,196 fans in the teams’ most recent seasons, the market’s second-highest total (behind only 558,830 in 2007).
Leading up to their 2014 season, the Class A RiverDogs, the city of Charleston and The Citadel (whose baseball team plays its home games at Joseph P. Riley Jr. Park) collaborated on funding for two new outfield video boards at the ballpark, including one in right field that has more than 1 million LED lights and provides nearly 1,000 square feet of viewing area, making it one of the largest scoreboards in Minor League Baseball. According to the RiverDogs, the total cost was “slightly north of $500,000.”
Additionally, a $22 million renovation of North Charleston Coliseum that was completed last fall was fully publicly funded and included improvements to every part of the building, from the back of the house to fan amenities. More than 185,000 fans flocked to see the ECHL Stingrays play at the modernized building in their 2014-15 season, a 40 percent leap over the previous season and the club’s highest total since 2008-09.
The USL Battery also continues to be one of the top-drawing minor league soccer clubs nationwide, consistently averaging about 3,800 fans per game over the past decade, and the team has said it is in the preliminary stages of assessing how to renovate sections of its stadium as well.
