And that takes wins and/or exciting play.

Billy just needs to implement his 7 seconds or less offense

...or BK to be able to prepare and execute on the sidelines.


...or maybe Stansbury has been asked to do that.

I would sell Stansbury as the face of the program in terms of coaching. BK has become a huge turnoff to the casual fan. The elite guys are not going to get here until next year and even then I think there will be the baggage of four years without postseason.

Win games, and the fans will come, whether BK is coaching, or Turgeon, or Rocky the Flying Squirrel.

Attendance fell about 10% Turgeon's last year, which contributed to his desire to leave, even though we were a tournament team.

Granted, attendance the last two seasons has been abysmal. But give us some meaningful games in February and March, and people will turn out.

I'm not convinced we'll have an NCAA team this season. Still not enough outside shooting, and not enough depth in the post.

The seven second offense was the dumbest concept I've ever heard of.

^
roy williams would agree

You know what I like? Setting up good shots weather it's 7 seconds or 30.

I think I can speak for just about everyone on this board, we don't care what you like. Roy Williams might though.

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lol We have a winner!

Telling these kids they most shot in seven seconds is just asking them to take poor shots.

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The seven second offense was the dumbest concept I've ever heard of.

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Unfortunately, last year our offense was a 37 sec offense on a 35 sec shot clock.

Win, and the fans will forgive kennedy for the damage he has done on our brand. Winning cures all

We should continue to gravy train Kenny Troutt until they pull up the wagons.

I think he likes the idea of keeping some of his home grown kids in Texas. A&M and its traditions make for a nice draw.

Now we need to just start winning



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Unfortunately, last year our offense was a 37 sec offense on a 35 sec shot clock.

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So you're saying we never really lost, just ran out of time?

fwiw, Kennedy said they'd be looking for shots in the first 7 seconds. This seems to go with, from what other posters and fans from his previous schools have said, that part of his strategy was to outrun and out-athlete other teams. Forcing the ball down the court would force opponents to keep up, open up some occasional easy shots, and encourage fouls. I could be wrong there, but that's how I heard it.

I don't know what coach will be in charge of what, but offensive identity will be the quickest clue as to what we can expect this season. It's been 3 straight seasons of confusion and loitering around the perimeter.

That's actually the offense BK would run sometimes at Murray State. There was a piece way back on ESPN or FSN at the time, and I remember thinking WTF??

Tempo was slow because their D would force teams deep into the shot clock.

+1 What Lance said.

As for butts in seats . . . its an issue of value for the money. I've said it before . . . Aggie basketball needs to be priced to put the LOCALS in the seats, and not just the top corners of the building. This is not a competitively priced product right now and it isn't JUST about winning. There aren't enough Aggies that will travel during the week to fill the arena, period, even when the team was winning under BCG.

$ Bill jacked prices up way to high, way too fast when BCG had success and the season ticket numbers have never rebounded. Drop prices, create demand (winning helps) and go from there. The failed $ Bill approach of "there is a base of basketball fans who will pay anything we charge" was an unmitigated disaster, and Hyman is a fool for following it.

The goal is NOT to get a family to come to a game once a year with "holiday pricing." You need the community to be able to invest in the program all year, so it has to be affordable. . .especially given that basketball historically ranks third in the pecking order for many local fans behind football and baseball. There's only so much money you can spend to watch the Ags, no matter how much you want to support them.

I would just fire sale tickets to the locals and see if they show up.

If the team starts to win and draw alumni/student interest again, then jack up the prices.

Of course, they were basically giving away tickets to the wyoming cbi game and like 2500 showed up.

Is it true that college basketball attendance is declining on average across the country? I seem to often see articles about it on the internet. Even articles about elite basketball schools like Kentucky seeing declining attendance.

http://johnclay.bloginky.com/2013/12/11/believe-it-or-not-uk-basketball-attendance-declining/

To me, I think the best way for A&M to try to get attendance up is to somehow get students more involved. We have such a huge student body sitting right there on campus and apparently 38,000 students showed up to watch the football game vs. Lamar last weekend, which was a record. And many of those 38,000 students paid for an 'All-Sports Pass' correct?

Our declines are way sharper than the national average. I think few schools have seen nearly a 50% decline in attendance in 3 years.

The students will not get involved until there is consistent winning. It is that simple. They could have gotten in free multiple times over the last three years and yet they still are not coming in. There is not much you can do to bring them in at this point, other than start winning and going to the postseason.

The same thing goes for the out of town alumni.

The casual fan (which is what we have lost) wants to see winning. They do not really care about recruits unless winning comes with it.

fan apathy is a direct response to hyman's apathy towards the program.
should tickets be cheaper? yes.
could we better market to the students? probably.
but the fan base has been turned off and it isnt coming back until a change is made. even if this team were to make the NIT, and we are looking at 2x 5 stars coming in, the fans wont even be back for the 2015-16 year because BK will still be the coach.

Grabbing Buzz or Pearl would've likely resulted in a 2-3k attendance jump.

all the "rah rah" crap on texags aside, the consumer chooses with their dollar and A&M fans have spoken loudly and clearly about how the feel about Billy Kennedy. if you are unsure, go look at WBB, which outdrew MBB for the first time ever at A&M.

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if you are unsure, go look at WBB, which outdrew MBB for the first time ever at A&M.

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They are going to outdraw them again this year.

I agree with Viva. (I'm as shocked as anyone, but when he's right, he's right)

In 07, there were scalpers outside our conference games.

"Having a nationally relevant team" is easier said than done, but there's your answer.

Okay, then with recruiting going great the next step is WIN. Method tried to skip a step in his thread title.

I think Pearl would have generated 2000 more season ticket sales. Ticket booth sales would be icing on top of that cake.

Instead, we are trying to ice a flapjack.

Pearl would've jumped interest and national interest. Winning would've come next and good times.

I thought that I read a few months back that the students were only offered the option of an all sports pass this year. That should be worth a few thousand more heads per game, at least once the semester starts.

so we're getting 2500 extra students per game? highly doubtful.

Plenty of students had the all sports pass option last year and they still didn't show up.

That is not going to help.

You could make every game free for students and I do not think you would see a significant increase in their attendance.

The issue is winning and until this team wins, you will not be able to do much increase attendance. This is not like BCG and Turgeon where we trying to figure out how to get more people in to watch a winning program. The casual fan who was there during BCG/Turg is gone.

Any attendance increase without winning is going to have to involve creative marketing to groups outside of students/alumni. It will also involve slashing prices but it isn't like anyone is buying tickets anyway, so they are losing money already.

Fans aren't going to watch more of the same, especially if it's failure.

Win, and they will come

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I think Pearl would have generated 2000 more season ticket sales. Ticket booth sales would be icing on top of that cake.

Instead, we are trying to ice a flapjack.

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about 4000 more once we started winning.


I'm basing this on an expected 4000/game and a 0.500 season with BK.

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Plenty of students had the all sports pass option last year and they still didn't show up.

That is not going to help.

You could make every game free for students and I do not think you would see a significant increase in their attendance.

The issue is winning and until this team wins, you will not be able to do much increase attendance. This is not like BCG and Turgeon where we trying to figure out how to get more people in to watch a winning program. The casual fan who was there during BCG/Turg is gone.

Any attendance increase without winning is going to have to involve creative marketing to groups outside of students/alumni. It will also involve slashing prices but it isn't like anyone is buying tickets anyway, so they are losing money already.

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THIS Ticket prices soared once we started winning. Once the losing began, you have a classic market bubble.

Crappy product. High prices.