On Wed, 29 Mar 2000, Anthony J. Buffa wrote:
 
> running the show, and never got a straight answer. Could it be that most
> of the seats are REALLY sold to the general public? I find this hard to
> believe. Or are most of the remaining good seats taken by the NCAA for
> their own use???
 
Just to echo Tony's comments, the ticket sales for next year's Frozen Four
at the Pepsi seems to be a little strange.  As an RPI season ticketholder
I was given the opportunity to purchase the Regional/Frozen Four package
before the seats would be offered to the public.  I sent in my order
promptly and could only garner Section 107, pretty good seats, but not in
the three center sections.  In fact, I don't know anyone who did get seats
to the Phinal Phour in the center sections.
 
At the Regionals there were a lot of empty seats in the prime sections.
So who is getting them?  I assume the NC$$ controls the seats in those
sections and doles them out to whoever they choose.  Certainly not a very
fan friendly policy, but that may be the price of success as college
hockey continues to grow in interest.
 
Back in 1992 (granted, a long time ago Phinal Phour wise) I grabbed
tickets dead center, 12 rows up.  This makes me conclude the new ticket
policy is a relatively recent one.  I don't expect that this kind of
availabilty will return, but I question who the NC$$ is serving with their
ticket policy.  As long as the Frozen Four continues to sell out every
year there is probably very little clout that fans can use to influence
the NC$$ to change their ticket policies.  But maybe we can point out to
them that their desire to attract more fans to the Regional sites,
particularly if the tournament goes to 16 teams and four sites, could be
hindered by ticket policies which are anti-fan.
 
I would think the NC$$ would be most interested in encouraging the growth
of the hard core fans who attend the tournaments year after year and
provide a stable attendance base.  If these fans feel they are
discriminated against attendance growth could be inhibited.  Or maybe not.
We should probably assume the guiding force for the NC$$ in their ticket
policies is...$$$.
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Brian Morris                 RPI Engineers
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