Can WSU Football Attendance Recover This Season?


It is no secret that the attendance at last year's home football games was not good. In 2023 WSU football had a 168,138 total attendance number over 6 games which comes out to an average of 28,023 per home game. In 2024 the attendance number saw a very steep decline. In 2024, WSU football's total attendance number was 134,480 over 6 home games. That is just an average of 22,413 fans per game. That is a decrease of nearly 6,000 fans per home game. A major drop off, causing less revenue for the athletic department at a time when revenue is desperately needed. 


Home Schedules 


At the surface it is easy to understand why there was such a significant drop in attendance in just a one year span. In 2023 WSU played Wisconsin, Northern Colorado, Oregon State, Arizona, Stanford and Colorado. 


In 2024 WSU played Portland State, Texas Tech, San Jose State, Hawai’i, Utah State and Wyoming at home. It is easy to see that this home schedule is less appealing than the home schedule was in 2023. 


The good news for WSU fans is that is the weakest home schedule we should see. The home schedule this year is a lot more interesting, and going forward the new Pac12 conference games should be more appealing as well. 


Looking at the 2025 home football schedule, it seems to line up better for improved attendance from 2024. WSU plays Idaho, SDSU, Washington, Toledo, Louisiana Tech and Oregon State at home.


2024 vs 2025 


Last season WSU’s highest attended home football game was Texas Tech, the game drew just over 27,000 fans, far from a Martin Stadium sell out crowd. This year, I would expect that the highest attended home game will be the Apple Cup. That game should be the Cougs first sellout since 2023. A sell out would represent a 6,000 fan increase from the Texas Tech game last year. 


Last year's home opener against Portland State drew a crowd of just 20,089. This game started at noon in blistering heat against a bad FCS opponent. I would expect that the home opener against The University of Idaho will draw a much better crowd this year. The game kicks off at 7pm so no heat excuse this year! With it also being more of a rivalry type game I expect attendance to be better for this home opener.  


Last year's family weekend game came against San Jose State. This game happened to be on a friday and attendance for the game was 24,808. This year's family weekend game is on October 25th at 12:30 against Toledo. Both opponents are probably a similar draw but hopefully having the family weekend game be on a Saturday midday can draw a bigger crowd. 


Last year's homecoming game was a midday, October game against Hawai’i. The game drew a crowd of 25,112. This year's homecoming game will be against future Pac12 foe SDSU on September 6th at 7:15pm. This game should be able to draw a good crowd as it should have good weather and it's another Pullman After Dark game. 


Last season WSU had a November home game against Utah State. The game drew a crowd of just 20,011. This year WSU plays a November home game against Louisiana Tech. I would expect that this game has the potential to be the lowest attended home game of the season. A reason for hope that the attendance for this one will be higher than the attendance for the Utah State game last year is the athletic department smartly put a home basketball game on the friday night before the Louisiana Tech game. These two games back to back should draw a bigger crowd to Pullman for both games. 


Lastly WSU ended the season with a home game against Wyoming last year. The game drew the worst crowd of the season with just 17,088 fans attending the game. This year however, the Cougs finished up the season with a home game against Oregon State. It seems likely that this game will have better attendance than Wyoming last year. 


Conclusion 


When going game by game and comparing the 2024 home game to the 2025 home games it feels very likely that attendance will increase in 2025. Increased attendance is vital to the athletic department. They badly need to increase revenue and put themselves in position to win Pac12 championships. 





Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

19 Cougs Enter the Transfer Portal: Full Breakdown

Image
With the spring transfer portal opening two days ago on April 16th the Cougs have already had 19 players enter the transfer portal. This list should be current up to April 18th at around 4pm.  Djouvensky Schlenbaker  Was a highly touted high school recruit. Appeared in 11 games last season and had 149 yards and three touchdowns. Acted as a great lead blocker for John Mateer. Found himself in a very crowded backfield this spring and probably was not going to see the field a ton this season.  Warren Smith  Appeared in 9 games last season as a backup. Came to Pullman as a highly touted cornerback with offers from 6 Pac12 schools. Another case of being in a very talented potion group and it was likely he wouldn't see the field a ton next season.  Hunter Najam  Redshirted at WSU last season as a preferred walk-on. Found himself battling for reps at the QB position. Was likely to be at least a third or fourth string QB this season.  Carson Osmus  He was...
Read more

Takeaways from WSU Football's Crimson & Gray Showcase: Standouts, Surprises and Spring Game Insights

Image
WSU Football wrapped up its last spring practice today with a slightly different version of the spring game instead calling it the Crimson & Gray Showcase. The 90 minute event had some position drills, a 1 on 1 session, 7 on 7 session and a scrimmage. The scrimmage included two 25 minute periods with the clock running the entire time. The defense and offense were split into two teams and the defense started with a 14-0 lead.  The two touchdown scorers during the scrimmage were redshirt senior receiver Leon Neal Jr. and redshirt sophomore TE Ben Dutton. Leon got open on a nicely lofted 7 yard pass from Zevi Eckhaus and Dutton scored his touchdown after finding himself wide open in the endzone and Jaxon Potter zipped a 10 yard pass to him.  Defensive Standouts  One of the biggest standouts of the defensive end was redshirt freshman DE Ben Beatty. He had at least 2 “sacks” and was getting into the backfield on a consistent basis. Another guy who made some nice plays on t...
Read more

Meet the 16 SDSU to WSU Transfers

Image
Meet the 16 SDSU to WSU Transfers WSU Football had 16 players follow Jimmy Rogers and staff from South Dakota State to Pullman. A lot of these players will be big contributors for the Cougs this season and in the coming seasons as well. Kirby Vorhees (RB) Vorhees comes to WSU as a redshirt sophomore after spending the last two years at SDSU. Vorhees is an extremely talented back who provided a great one-two punch with Angel Johnson at SDSU. Vorhees had 75 carries last season and averaged 7.7 yards per carry. He also added 8 rushing touchdowns to his impressive freshman season. Vorhees should compete for the RB2 role this season and looks to build off a very strong redshirt freshman campaign. Tucker Large (S) Tucker Large is another high-level addition to the WSU roster. Large was a big part of the 2023 SDSU team that won an FCS national championship. Large comes to WSU after taking a redshirt season, spending the last four years at SDSU. Multiple coaches have raved about him, and he ha...
Read more