Thursday, February 4th 2010

By Brian Decker

DAVID KOOTS & BRIAN DECKER

ASSISTANT SPORTS EDITOR AND SPORTS EDITOR

This past Saturday, the women’s basketball team travelled to Waterloo, only to lose to the 4-12 Warriors in a major upset. The Warriors were spurred to victory by a gym packed full of loud, spirited student fans.

That same night, the women’s volleyball team, having won 11 of its last 12 games, hosted their rivals, also from Waterloo, in a crucial divisional match up. However, a show of hands drawn by MSU presidential candidate Casey Park showed just a small handful of students in the crowd.

How is it that a 4-12 team can pack a gym full of students while the OUA’s top volleyball team can only draw a couple dozen students? One possibility may be that Waterloo offers its student free admission to games, while Mac charges five dollars entry.

If Park is successful in his bid for presidency, however, McMaster undergraduate students could soon see a change.

“As MSU President I would be absolutely focused on working with Athletics and Recreation to work out a system to get free admission for undergraduate students. In terms of our relationship with other universities around Ontario, I know that Western, Queen’s and U of T, for regular season games all three schools do have free games.”

In fact, of the major Ontario universities, Mac is joined by only Ottawa, Carleton and Guelph in charging students admission to volleyball and basketball regular season games, while Laurier and Waterloo charge only for football.

The trend across the country suggests a majority of schools have found a way to offer free student admission, with major universities like Victoria, Simon Fraser, Calgary, Dalhousie, and St. Mary’s all offering free entry.

If elected, Park plans on meeting and working with Athletics and Recreation in order to find a system that could work, whether it be by restructuring the current Athletics fee or charging only for marquee games such as football Homecoming or playoffs. Other universities that do not offer free admission have setup systems where students may purchase a season pass, priced from as low as $10 at UBC to $130 at the hockey-crazed University of Alberta.

When asked about the issue of low student attendance, Jeff Giles, the Director of Athletics and Recreation, explained that increasing student attendance is a chief goal of the department.

“It is one of our primary goals, increasing student attendance at our games. So are we willing to talk about options? Absolutely.”

“As you’ll understand, I’ve only been here for eight months. It’s my understanding we went from free many years ago to two dollars to five dollars, and I’m not exactly sure how that happened, but we are looking at different schemes … we spend a lot of money on game day programs, thundersticks and fireworks. Our challenge is how do we get more students out to the games.”

Giles made it clear that having a large, boisterous crowd by any means was absolutely in the department’s interest.

“Put it this way. If we could guarantee that we would have a sell out at every football game and we could put 3, 4, 5,000 people into that stadium, there are other ways we could generate revenue, through sponsorships and marketing and promotion and that type of thing and maybe offset the price for students, so it’s kind of like the chicken and the egg thing. If they come, then we can sell more revenue.”

For Park, the answer to bringing more students out to watch McMaster’s varsity teams play is to eliminate the cost of admission.

“In order for McMaster school spirit to even come close to being as fervent as Queen’s and Western we need to absolutely push the whole culture that going to games is the thing to do.”

“Even though it only costs roughly five dollars on average for a sporting event, five dollars is still five dollars for students, and that is a barrier to getting the ticket alone, whereas if there was a system where you just flashed your student card and proved you were an undergraduate, then there might actually be less of a barrier for students actually going to games.”

At Tuesday’s debate, Park used the example of a student house in which a couple of members invite the remainder of the house to the game on a Friday night. If the other housemates are not fans of the sport then they would be most likely unwilling to fork over five dollars. However, with free admission they may be more likely to come along as a free social event.

Outside of Welcome Week, there are very few opportunities to generate school spirit. Athletics, however, is an avenue that has historically built a sense of community with universities. One cannot watch an NCAA college football or basketball game and deny the sense of community built and shown around a team’s nickname and colours.

And while no one expects McMaster varsity teams to sell out 80,000 seat stadiums for regular season match ups, there are many quality athletes playing on excellent teams at this school that are worth coming out and watching. Coming out to watch one of these teams and getting to know the players benefits not only Athletics and Recreation, but also student interest and alumni support.

While Giles argues a Catch-22 situation, the chicken and egg continue to stay at home, while the stands remain empty.

Tags: athletics and recreation, Casey Park, Marauders, Sports, students