Iowa State women outdraw Iowa men

[SlyCy]

Taken from the CR Gazette this morning.

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Iowa State women outdraw Iowa men

John Wooden, the legendary former coach at UCLA, says he’d rather watch a good women’s basketball game these days than a men’s game because the women play the game the way it was meant to be played and are fundamentally sound.
Wooden is not alone in his feelings.
This might be a sign of the apocalypse (or maybe not), but there’s a prime example of what Wooden’s talking about right here in Iowa.
Consider this startling fact: The Iowa State women’s basketball
team is more popular than the University of Iowa
men’s basketball team right now. Yes, that’s right. The ISU women are more popular than the Iowa men, based on their home attendance marks. The Cyclones are averaging 10,078 fans at Hilton Coliseum, and the Hawkeyes are averaging 9,119 at CarverHawkeye Arena.
Remember, that’s the Cyclone women we’re talking about, not the Cyclone men.
The ISU men’s team is averaging 14,243 at Hilton.
A little of this is apples and oranges, of course. It costs a lot less to attend an Iowa State women’s game than it does an Iowa men’s game, but it’s a startling development nonetheless.
The Hawkeyes are suffering from the residual negative effects of the Steve Alford regime, coupled with low expectations for this year’s club.
The Cyclones, meanwhile, are benefiting from Coach Bill Fennelly’s years of good work in Ames and clever promotional work by his university. Iowa basketball games used to be the social event of the week. Now the arena is halfempty, most fans can’t get the games on TV because of the fiasco with the Big Ten Network, and those 8 p.m. starts are driving people away.
We could bring the Iowa women’s basketball program into the conversation, but that’s even more embarrassing for the Hawkeyes. Coach Lisa Bluder’s team is averaging 2,622 fans at home and drew only 2,963 for the Big Ten/ACC game against Georgia Tech two weeks ago despite selling tickets for $1.
The Iowa State women are drawing more fans than four men’s bask etball teams in the Big Ten — Michigan, Iowa, Penn State and Northwestern.
It’s hard for a lot of fans to get excited about Big Ten basketball. The league got clobbered in the Big Ten/ACC Challenge again, and Big Ten teams have a dismal 4-13 record against Top 25 opponents.
Some of the Big Ten’s nonconference losses have been head-scratchers for a proud league. Iowa lost to Louisiana- Monroe. Michigan lost to Harvard, now led by deposed U-M coach Tommy Amaker. Northwestern lost to Brown. Penn State lost to Rider. Ohio State beat Coppin State but scored only 47 points.
Iowa Coach Todd Lickliter said it’s too early to label this a ‘‘down’’ year for the Big Ten.
‘‘I think even in a down year, you’ve got a great conference here. Without question,’’ he said. ‘‘And I don’t know that it is a down year. We’ll probably evaluate that at the end.’’
• Contact the writer: (319) 368-8697 or jim.ecker@gazettecommunications.com

[tim_redd]

Ouch....That's a low blow.

Fortunately, the women aint got nothing down there.

[cycloneworld]

There is an article about this in the Des Moines Register today as well.

Iowa basketball: An empty feeling at Carver-Hawkeye | DesMoinesRegister.com | The Des Moines Register

That has to be embarrassing to Hawk fans that the ISU women are outdrawing them.

Biggest line in the Article:

The paid attendance average for Iowa's seven home games this season is 9,119. The actual attendance average is 4,658.

[wartknight]

Yeah, the article says they have had just 4658 butts in seats for games.

[isucyfan]

Originally Posted by wartknight

Yeah, the article says they have had just 4658 butts in seats for games.

Yeah, but SouthernHawk has an explanation of why this is wrong, I'm sure.

[Cyclone62]

Holy Crap! You can't even draw 3K fans with $1 tickets? A night of TV costs more than that.

[JJ4ISU]

Iowa City is such a great town, and there is so much to do there that it is taking away from the basketball programs...NOT!

[SVT]

So we know what the actual attendance is for the Iowa Men's team, but does anyone know the actual attendance of the ISU Women?

[redrocker]

Originally Posted by isucyfan

Yeah, but SouthernHawk has an explanation of why this is wrong, I'm sure.

I think he is ignoring us now.

[HOTDON]

My family Christmas is going to outdraw the Hawks this season.

[CyBobby]

Originally Posted by SVT

So we know what the actual attendance is for the Iowa Men's team, but does anyone know the actual attendance of the ISU Women?

Thats an easy one to answer: Ia State women are actually drawing TWICE AS MANY FANS as the u of i mens b-ball team.

[BenEClone]

"startling fact"? Only if the author has been living under a rock. He may be startled by the lack of support for Iowa, but, the support for the Twister Sisters is legendary and, IMHO, one of the great advantages ISU has in recruiting. If a girl is serious about playing college ball - there is no better place than Hilton.

[jdoggivjc]

Originally Posted by BenEClone

"startling fact"? Only if the author has been living under a rock. He may be startled by the lack of support for Iowa, but, the support for the Twister Sisters is legendary and, IMHO, one of the great advantages ISU has in recruiting. If a girl is serious about playing college ball - there is no better place than Hilton.

Well, the ladies in Knoxville (TN) and Storrs (CT) might argue with you on that one, and I'd probably be inclined to agree with them. However, the WBB environment in Ames is probably only a slight cut below theirs, and hopefully it's only a matter of time before we annually have a top 10 team to go with that environment.

[EggMcClone]

I just want to say that ISU has some damn impressive fans. No matter how bad we are we're still near the top of the Big 12 in men's and women's basketball attendance every single year and are averaging over 14,000 in what is shaping up to be one of the most frustrating basketball seasons in a long time. Plus you can add in to that the news about the volleyball and wrestling attendances and finding ways to set new records during a horrid football season. Well done, Cyclones.

[bjwitt]

That just proves how bad hawk fans are and how good our women are going to do this year.