Can the WNBA equal the attention (or the attendance) generated by women's college basketball?
That questions comes up near the start and the end of each season, every year, sometimes from knowledgeable supporters, sometimes from people who just don't like the pro league.
But the right answer is that in many ways the WNBA already has equaled the success of the college game.
The worst team in the WNBA this year, the Charlotte Sting, not coincidentally had the worst attendance: 5,768, according to Kim Callahan (warning: PDF).
Among the few hundred schools that play NCAA Division I women's hoops, how many attracted more fans per game than Charlotte? Sixteen. How many of them had losing records? Just one: Wisconsin.
Of course, published numbers can be unreliable, especially in the pros. On the other hand, college teams can boost their numbers simply because they tend to play on college campuses, and students (rightly) get much cheaper tickets, not to mention convenient transportation to and from games (often, the sidewalk between arena and dorm). So the distortions, if that's what they are, work both ways.
Among teams that finished the WNBA season over .500, the team with the worst attendance was the Houston Comets, who seem never to have recovered (in terms of fan support) from their move to the Toyota Center. The Comets claim 7,099 fans per game.
How many women's college teams beat that number? Ten.
Defending (now former) champions Seattle claimed 8,891 fans per game, and full lower bowls on TV prove those fans showed up. Just five women's college teams do better, including Connecticut and Tennessee.
The WNBA has been around for nine years, and most of their teams have no historic connection to their communities except (as with the Monarchs, Sparks and Liberty) the connection that grows from long-cherished NBA partners.
The colleges whose women's hoops teams post numbers anything like what the WNBA publishes, or numbers like what most WNBA teams (not Charlotte, perhaps, but Houston and San Antonio) actually deliver to summer arenas, have been around for over 100 years. Four of the top twelve have won it all since 1998; eight have been to the Final Four.
And fans love wins. Those winning colleges depend for some of those wins on the existence of schools few people follow, schools they always beat: major-conference doormats, local nonconference opponents who always lose to crosstown rivals in November, teams that fill up slots 13 to 16 in the brackets every March.
WNBA teams have no such guaranteed pleasures. As players and coaches like to say, on any given day, "any team in the league can beat any other team in the league." Even Charlotte.
(When you take location into account, the W looks even better. The top college women's team in a large urban market, with competition from major-league pro men's teams, is Minnesota, at 9,020 fans per game in the year after a Final Four, or almost exactly what Seattle attracted the year after a WNBA title, in a metro area of the same size. After Minnesota comes Ohio State, at 5,143: their competition is the NHL's Blue Jackets, who did not play last year. After the Buckeyes come the University of Maryland, at 4,189, or 72% of a Charlotte Sting crowd.)
College teams draw superbly when the team wins a lot, or has won a lot recently (Wisconsin used to be a fearsome team); when there are few competing entertainment options; and when they can claim to represent their region, or their state, i.e. they're a state school with many local alums. (If then: North Carolina puts up mysteriously abysmal attendance for a superb women's team.)
WNBA teams draw when they win, and in big metro areas with lots of transplants or many competing schools, WNBA teams (like pro men's teams in any sport) have as good a claim as any one school to represent the city as a whole. (Absence of baseball helps, too. #@%$ Washington Nationals.)
And people who fear that our girls syndrome (or anything else) will keep the W from attracting college-game numbers are making at least one serious mistake: they're comparing a few selected, historic successes (from the college game) to a whole league (winners, losers, mediocrities), and then asking why the very top of one class outperforms the entirety of the other. Compare apples to apples, regular season to regular season, even college reg-season to WNBA playoffs, and the W looks OK.
Playoff to playoff-- or rather, NCAA national tournament to WNBA playoffs-- it may be a different story. More on that one soon.
That questions comes up near the start and the end of each season, every year, sometimes from knowledgeable supporters, sometimes from people who just don't like the pro league.
But the right answer is that in many ways the WNBA already has equaled the success of the college game.
The worst team in the WNBA this year, the Charlotte Sting, not coincidentally had the worst attendance: 5,768, according to Kim Callahan (warning: PDF).
Among the few hundred schools that play NCAA Division I women's hoops, how many attracted more fans per game than Charlotte? Sixteen. How many of them had losing records? Just one: Wisconsin.
Of course, published numbers can be unreliable, especially in the pros. On the other hand, college teams can boost their numbers simply because they tend to play on college campuses, and students (rightly) get much cheaper tickets, not to mention convenient transportation to and from games (often, the sidewalk between arena and dorm). So the distortions, if that's what they are, work both ways.
Among teams that finished the WNBA season over .500, the team with the worst attendance was the Houston Comets, who seem never to have recovered (in terms of fan support) from their move to the Toyota Center. The Comets claim 7,099 fans per game.
How many women's college teams beat that number? Ten.
Defending (now former) champions Seattle claimed 8,891 fans per game, and full lower bowls on TV prove those fans showed up. Just five women's college teams do better, including Connecticut and Tennessee.
The WNBA has been around for nine years, and most of their teams have no historic connection to their communities except (as with the Monarchs, Sparks and Liberty) the connection that grows from long-cherished NBA partners.
The colleges whose women's hoops teams post numbers anything like what the WNBA publishes, or numbers like what most WNBA teams (not Charlotte, perhaps, but Houston and San Antonio) actually deliver to summer arenas, have been around for over 100 years. Four of the top twelve have won it all since 1998; eight have been to the Final Four.
And fans love wins. Those winning colleges depend for some of those wins on the existence of schools few people follow, schools they always beat: major-conference doormats, local nonconference opponents who always lose to crosstown rivals in November, teams that fill up slots 13 to 16 in the brackets every March.
WNBA teams have no such guaranteed pleasures. As players and coaches like to say, on any given day, "any team in the league can beat any other team in the league." Even Charlotte.
(When you take location into account, the W looks even better. The top college women's team in a large urban market, with competition from major-league pro men's teams, is Minnesota, at 9,020 fans per game in the year after a Final Four, or almost exactly what Seattle attracted the year after a WNBA title, in a metro area of the same size. After Minnesota comes Ohio State, at 5,143: their competition is the NHL's Blue Jackets, who did not play last year. After the Buckeyes come the University of Maryland, at 4,189, or 72% of a Charlotte Sting crowd.)
College teams draw superbly when the team wins a lot, or has won a lot recently (Wisconsin used to be a fearsome team); when there are few competing entertainment options; and when they can claim to represent their region, or their state, i.e. they're a state school with many local alums. (If then: North Carolina puts up mysteriously abysmal attendance for a superb women's team.)
WNBA teams draw when they win, and in big metro areas with lots of transplants or many competing schools, WNBA teams (like pro men's teams in any sport) have as good a claim as any one school to represent the city as a whole. (Absence of baseball helps, too. #@%$ Washington Nationals.)
And people who fear that our girls syndrome (or anything else) will keep the W from attracting college-game numbers are making at least one serious mistake: they're comparing a few selected, historic successes (from the college game) to a whole league (winners, losers, mediocrities), and then asking why the very top of one class outperforms the entirety of the other. Compare apples to apples, regular season to regular season, even college reg-season to WNBA playoffs, and the W looks OK.
Playoff to playoff-- or rather, NCAA national tournament to WNBA playoffs-- it may be a different story. More on that one soon.
posted by Jessie B at 6:51 AM
