Aaron

Michigan is most relevant and equivalent example in Big Ten right now.

That could be a reason and legitimate. However, would you have dropped if team was ranked and won nearly 30 games. If you were going to drop anyways you may have hit on a factor. If being less then excellent caused you not to renew and would have otherwise, that is something you are certainly entitled to do but that behavior (better or worse) sheds some light on how fan base thinks. Don't blame you for your specific case. We would need to hear from others and cross reference with other schools to find the smoking gun for this pattern but your particular case def sheds a tiny bit of light.

Michigan has all the buffet of sports options as Indiana and lost no season ticket holders for its women's basketball program after one good season that was slightly less than others. Its a conundrum that the athletic department has to figure out. Nowhere else loses 30-40% of ticket holders over a women's season like last.

This survey is important since no other school wins 20 games and loses mass numbers of season ticket holders. There is clearly something unique about our fan base being more front running than others. Our athletic department needs to get to bottom of it if it does not want to lose a large percentage of season ticket holders after good but not great seasons when nowhere else does.

Exactly when we were ranked and times were the most sunny attendance grew and grew. Now one 20-13 season loses 40% of season ticket holders. Iowa with similar success recently has sold out last two seasons even without Caitlin Clark. Michigan whose path has mirrored IU each season recently including last, lost no season ticket holders last year and Michigan's sports options are no different than Indiana's. This proves my point that our fan base even in equivalent spots in equivalent sports has always had more frontrunners.

Totally agree with all of that. However, no program like women's basketball should have to endure losing nearly 40% of its season ticket holders over a 20-13 team with an NCAA appearance. That doesn't happen at most if any other places after five straight years of being ranked each week and then one solid top-30 season not ranked. This is where the problem comes in and is not an issue at most schools. Michigan women had a worse season than usual last year and equivalent rise of IU before that and lost almost no season ticket holders. Meanwhile, Iowa has sold out its next two non-Caitlin Clark seasons recently that saw similar results to IU last year. I get IU is competing with more sports here, but it shows our fans priority for our fan base in general.

A five year run of being ranked each and every week is pretty 'elite' and matched only 1-2 others. Iowa has sold out season tickets post Caitlin Clark each of the last two seasons and their recent run is similar to IU. A 20-13 season does not warrant losing 40% of season ticket holders and would not anywhere else. Attendance absolutely is tied to winning but definition of 'winning' needs to be upped by our lot of fans if we want constant success in any program. Losing nearly 40% of season ticket holders in IU women tells me our fans view of what constitutes 'winning' is not consistent with elsewhere.

Again I agree with most of what you are saying and hope you are right and I am wrong. Proof will be in pudding though and history says otherwise. Really hope football's likely eight win season next yr is a new leaf for our fan base but past precedent says otherwise. Really hope you turn out right. No one more than me is rooting for that.

And you are entitled to that opinion, but it answers why last night was sparse and 3k season ticket holders were lost in offseason. There is a big different between hoping for 23-24 wins and less than 10 losses (which is perfectly acceptable) and considering not getting there with only 20 wins a failure and losing nearly 40% of ticketholders. This is where problem is. Not "hoping for more' which every rational fan absolutely should and zero reason to lower expectations.

Don't disagree with a lot of you are saying. However, it does mean a lot more work to get butts in seats at IU compared to most, hence the empty ones seen last night. There is nothing in the women's b-ball product last year that should have caused team to lose roughly 3k of its 8k season ticket holders. No where else loses nearly 40% of its season ticket holders from last years products and generally maintains steady or gains. Yes its still light years ahead of past, but if you bleed at this number or even half of it over 2-3 more 20 win seasons, it is no higher than Pre-Moren. Hopefully the most front running fans were weeded out, but if a similar season to last loses another 1-2k which is possible my point is well proven. Almost any other school with two 20-win seasons with NCAA appearance with an 8k ticket base would hold steady or gain not shrink by nearly half. Here it is considered a failure and bleeds support. We need a lot more people in this fan base to stop considering these 20-win seasons (or in football's case 8 wins) not enough. You want long sustained success for a program outside soccer? A big part of it is not losing 40% of a fan base over a top-30 NCAA appearance. You will see my point when next years eight-win 'rebuilding' football season wins 8 games and loses 20-40% of season ticket holders which will absolutely happen here and not anywhere else. Prove me wrong. I hope I am wrong, but every historical perspective here including with Mallory, and now with women's basketball and more recently baseball, makes me very skeptical you won't lose thousands of ticket holders over a solid season which does not happen elsewhere.

And this attitude proves my point. In any other fan bases world, constant 20 win seasons is celebrated, not asking for more. You are entitled to feel that way but this attitude answers my question in my mind even if some might disagree.

I warned about this in another thread and its not the ticket distribution. You can easily buy them for a few $$$ on Seatgeek and plenty available higher up. This is because a much larger percentage of our fan base then most others is especially front running compared to other college fan bases and this is a massive issue across the board issue when it comes to IU. This is not a problem with people on the board or devout fan, but the number of people in our fan base who refuse to support anything less than a top 5-10 team in that sport is why you see this. I deal with this everyday with fellow Hoosier fans. Ask other fan bases about their decent postseason squads and if they go and the answer is 'yes'. Ask an IU fan about women's basketball or baseball now and they will tell you they followed them a couple of years ago when they were elite and in Schwarber days respectively. This is not normal behavior from a fan base and generally once a team has great seasons and become elite, a slight fall off to constant postseason squads is enough to maintain a fan base but not at IU. Until our casual fans change their behavior to mirror what other schools do, you won't see a football stadium expansion or top NIL money available. I am very skeptical yearly eight win Cignetti teams can draw more than 35k as the Mallory years showed and was partially (although not completely) responsible for fall off. We have a good number of loyal fans (and the people on this board are amongst that), but the amount of casual fans who will maintain their interest for a winning but non-elite squad is much higher than a normal college fan base. My estimates at most schools is its about 60% front running 40% loyal. At IU its 90% front running and 10% loyal. Until 30% more casuals like many I know become loyal, this problem isn't going away. We better hope Moren's new elite recruits make them top-10 teams yearly and Cignetti's "next emerging super power" is true. Anything less, like a 20-13 postseason squad or eight win bowl team will not be supported much better than a losing 13-20 or four win football team seen through most of the programs history. IU has a serious front-running fan problem that is far greater than most schools and I don't have a good answer as to why, other than it being a very real thing. This 20-win postseason women's team bleeding attendance is unfortunately entirely predictable and would not happen with most other schools. As an example, Purdue women's elite performance for a half-dozen years giving way to second round tourney exits saw very little fan drop off and even decent support for their awful product now. For IU, one year of 20 wins vs. being elite and you bleed thousands of season ticket holders. This front-running attitude amongst vast majority of the IU fan base is a very real problem that most IU fans need to look in the mirror and confront. Until then, the necessary revenue to sustain winning across board will go through these 2-5 year elite cycles followed by coaching changes and slow decline. I don't take pride in any of this and it sucks, but its a hard truth for diehards like ourselves on this board.

Hopefully, tonight will be a preview of football tomorrow as expected. IU clubbed a bad Maryland side over the head with an easy three-set sweep to stay on track to host in the NCAA Tournament.

As I've said, this is how recruiting is supposed to look with the level IU has won at. Makalusky and Caffey are clearly the highest-ranked recruits in many years for a reason (and in Makalusky's case highest ever until next year), and Battle and Nyemcheck are even higher and could well be 5* by next fall, being in the top-30. Moren said she wanted better athletes who are higher ranked, and the new recruiting coach has delivered big in the last two classes with this.

Not really. They beat a top-flight Kentucky and Notre Dame squad on the road, also. For whatever reason, conference road games have been a bugaboo much more than road games overall. If you can hold on to a top-8 NCAA seed (RPI is exactly 8), the team will play at least two NCAA Tournament games at home against non-Big Ten squads, which has been the sweet spot this fall, and the team has no. 1 non-conference RPI in the nation. Can't wait to get out of conference play and try their luck against other opponents at home, where the team has been best. As I said, offense could take the team to a College Cup or the defense could end their season in the first round, and both are equally likely given positioning. Team is 4-3-1 in Quad one, 1-1 in Quad two, 4-1 in Quad three, and 1-0 in Quad four. The resume is actually quite strong, and the committee doesn't look at conference record: https://rpiupdatemenssoccer.blogspot.com/2025/07/indiana.html