EUGENE — For the first several years of the Matthew Knight Arena era, it was often the Oregon Ducks basketball team that carried the crowd, not the other way around.
Make no mistake, Oregon’s current success on the court is nothing new. Since Dana Altman took over as men’s basketball coach in 2010, the Ducks have won 174 game and lost 67. Altman has led the Ducks to four straight NCAA Tournaments, two Sweet 16s and last year’s Elite Eight appearance.
And, relatively speaking, few have watched it up close.
Oregon’s attendance issues at Matthew Knight Arena were outlined a year ago in a report by The Oregonian/OregonLive after Oregon saw its worst attendance since 1992 during the 2014-15 basketball season.
While basketball attendance was up throughout the country, it had bottomed out for Oregon as an average of 6,209 fans strolled into the four-year-old arena to watch a Ducks team that finished second in the Pac-12 and would go on to win a game at the NCAA Tournament.
There were numerous reasons outlined for the decline. The Ducks had few familiar faces returning after a summer of controversy, parking was a concern, ticket prices were higher than they are now and Oregon was still vastly known as a football school.
And all together, the atmosphere inside of the state of the art facility suffered.
All of that would be hard to believe that based on the crowd at Thursday night’s Oregon game against Arizona State.
Two years ago, a midweek game against a team residing in the bottom third of the Pac-12 tipping off at 8 p.m. would have meant MKA would have been barren.
Want proof? In 2014-15, Oregon played Arizona State on a Saturday and only 5,637 fans attended.
But here was Matthew Knight Arena on Thursday night, an evening in which freezing rains was forecasted to grip much of the state, and a near sellout crowd of 11,901 watched a bad Arizona State team nearly upset a poorly-playing Oregon team.
And here’s the thing: Not only will the crowd be back on Saturday for No. 13 Oregon’s much-hyped game against No. 5 Arizona, but instances like Thursday night are becoming the norm — not the outlier — for a basketball program that finally seems to have the crowds to match the play on the court.
“When this building is full it changes the whole atmosphere for everybody,” Oregon Athletic Director Rob Mullens said. “It’s a completely different experience. It’s a priority for us. It helps our team. It’s a huge home court advantage. This team has competed at a high level and they should be rewarded. It’s part of the collegiate experience. It’s what makes it different.”
The difference in attendance between now and two years ago is significant. While Oregon took a step forward last season by increasing overall attendance by 20 percent, the Ducks are even blowing away that average of 7,467 fans per game.
Following the Arizona State game, Oregon’s average attendance per game is sitting at 9,365. That’s a 50 percent increase from two seasons ago and a number that is expected to keep climbing. Oregon has sold out Saturday’s game against Arizona and has another sellout on the books for Feb. 18 against Colorado.
Craig Pintens, Oregon’s senior associate athletic director in charge of marketing, said the Ducks are on pace to have their highest attendance since 1979, when Oregon averaged 9,864 per game. Including Arizona and Colorado, the Ducks are guaranteed to have six sellouts this season a year after having only two and none the year before.
There are several factors that have played into the rise, according to Mullens. Ticket prices were lowered prior to last season, some parking issues were addressed and they’ve continued to tinker with the in-arena experience during games. Over the last year the Ducks have ditched their pre-game hype man, upped some of the theatrics during player introductions and placed Don Essig behind the PA microphone.
Strategy came into play, too. Pintens said there was focus on selling mini-plans, which packaged their best games, in an attempt to boost future season-ticket sales.
They sold over 2,500.
There was also a goal of selling out the Oregon State and Arizona games prior to Dec. 1 to help create demand. They did.
Now, after finishing sixth in conference attendance a year ago, the Ducks will likely finish fourth behind the schools with long histories of big gates: Arizona, Utah and UCLA, finally giving the Ducks, who own a 39-game home winning streak, a crowd to match the play on the court.
“We want to be one of the top atmospheres in the country,” Mullens said. “This has every opportunity to be intimate, loud and intimidating. That’s our vision and we’re still finding our sweet spot.”
— Tyson Alger
talger@oregonian.com
@tysonalger
— Tyson Alger
talger@oregonian.com
@tysonalger
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