][ THE SCOOP PEOPLE, PLACES, THINGS, NEWS, TRENDS Numbers Game
NCAA exploring non-NFL venues, ways to boost championship attendance
By Corey McLaughlin
or Northeast NFL stadium, rotating between M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore, Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia and Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Mass. The Division I men’s semifi nals and fi nal and Division II and III title games traditionally have been played over Memorial Day weekend. Total attendance boomed for the fi rst fi ve years of the NFL stadium era to a record high of 123,225 in Baltimore in 2007, but has since dipped below 80,000 in each of the last two seasons in Philadelphia and Foxborough. The 2014 men’s championships will be held May 24-26 at M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore, but sites for 2015 and beyond have not yet been announced. The NCAA began accepting bids for 2015-18 in mid-July, and the committee that oversees championships will meet in August to discuss the attendance decline as part of its annual review. That same committee will comb over bids through September and future sites will be announced in December.
H ➼ A Publication of US Lacrosse August 2013 >> LACROSSE MAGAZINE 13
ow do you fi x an attendance issue? That’s the question the NCAA is tackling as it looks to address a six- year trend of declining attendance at college lacrosse’s signature event: men’s championship weekend.
Beginning in 2003, the crown jewel of May Madness has been set in a Mid-Atlantic
©PHOTO CREDIT ©KEVIN P. TUCKER
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