>I may be provincial, but the newspaper coverage of this tournament far
>exceeded what I have seen in any other town during the NCAA's.  Now
>granted, BC being in the final had something to do with it but college
>hockey consistently outdraws college basketball in this town year after
>year.  It was nice to see the print media (television is hopeless) awake to
>this fact.
 
*Something* to do with it?  BC being in the final, and the final being in
Boston had everything to do with it.  Boston is the most provinical large
city I've ever visited.  Nothing happens unless it happens here.  This is
the only place where you'll see headlines reading "20 People Killed in
Tornado in  Illinois; No One in Boston Hurt."  Every national news story is
followed by a story about the "Boston connection," which is often so
attenuated as to be absurd.
 
As for the support for hockey, maybe it's good for college hockey (but I
doubt it, I hardly read or hear anything about college hockey in the Boston
media), but it's laughable for the pros.  According to the April 10, 1998
edition of The Hockey News, attendance for Bruins games to date this season
has been 82%.  That's 5 percent *lower* than last year, when the team was
arguably the worst in the NHL.  Only Carolina (41% !!!), Los Angeles (78%),
NY Islanders (74%), Tampa Bay (68%), and Washington (78%) had lower
attendance figures.  Now, Carolina's problems are obvious, Los Angeles has
notoriously bad fans (although the Ducks average 99%, go figure), the
Islanders are an abomination, Tampa Bay is the worst team I've ever seen
(and what a hideous sweater), and Washington. . .well, that's difficult to
explain -- good team, great sweaters, I guess their fans just suck.  At any
rate, it's not very good company for Boston.
 
In contrast, Detroit, which actually calls itself "Hovkeytown," has an
average attendance of 100%, despite the higher ticket prices already
mentioned by someone else.  For the curious, the other teams to average
100% attendance are: Colorado, Florida (!!), NY Rangers (Go Rangers!),
Philadelphia, and Toronto.  Incidentally, can you believe Montreal doesn't
average 100% attendance (it is close -- 97%)?
 
I would also note that thi gives Boston lower attendance than any of the
other original six teams, and only Chicago (86%) is close.
 
Carl Sussman
 
 
 
Carl Sussman                                              Harvard Law School
 
[log in to unmask]                             Class of '99
 
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