When you imagine being at a live Ateneo Men’s Basketball game, you probably picture any of the following: A raucous crowd split between Blue and (most likely) Maroon or Green, thundering drum beats, and highlight plays.
But as exciting as all of that sounds, you would probably be lying if you said that the prospect of scavenging social media or lining up at an ungodly hour for tickets does not make you shudder.
Failing to come by tickets for a game is a common pain point for student-fans, and the convenient response would be to write it off to shady ticket politics or some grand systemic problem keeping students out of stadiums. But digging deeper, there is something more to this non-attendance than students simply being left out.
While Ateneo has a duty to allocate tickets to alumni and sponsors that support the team, this does not take away from the seats that students can fill. In fact, University Athletic Association of the Philippines (UAAP) President Em Fernandez explains that tickets allocated for sale to students stand up to the combined total for sponsors and alumni. However, the numbers show that sales to sponsors and alumni are higher.
It comes down to the simple fact that students just do not watch most of the games. Instead, attendance is conditioned by convenience and occasion, and when everyone wants to watch the same game, it cannot be helped that people are left out.
Missing interest
One of the draws to watching live games is the chance to see larger-than-life personalities in person. For Ateneans, the factor of “star power” arguably carries less weight than it would for a fan outside Ateneo, which takes away from the urge to support. The sheen of star power wears off a little when you see them queueing in the cafeteria or hunched over a reading in the library. Of course, this opens up the possibility for support to be driven by solidarity, but ticket sales still say otherwise.
Moreover, a lot of time and effort is required to see these games live. Time spent in traffic takes away precious hours from academic and org requirements—not to mention the extra money spent on tickets and food. Easy access to live streaming and television coverage makes these inconveniences disappear, pulling more people away from sitting in seats.
Selective participation
Another reason for the lack of attendance across all matches is the fact that only so-called “big” games get attention from students. “The students’ choice to watch the game depends on the rival team we will face,” Office of College Athletics Coordinator Benjamin Afuang explains.
Matches against the De La Salle University or the University of the Philippines have more spectators because these games have become social events as much as they are basketball games. Other matches that do not get lead billing are thus not given enough attention by Ateneo’s students—leading to low attendance.
What more can we do?
As UAAP Season 82 hosts, Ateneo introduced “Student Wednesdays” to encourage students to attend UAAP Basketball games. Matches that fall on Wednesdays are priced at only Php 35. However, the only tickets that fall under this promo are the Upper Box and General Admission seats, which pale in comparison to the seats that alumni, donors, and sponsors watch the games from.
But if students don’t watch games anyway, why give them the best seats in the house? Over the years, Ateneo has tried many gambits to entice students to watch games, like free rides and even free tickets. Sadly, none of these promotions seem to have worked. “Student Wednesdays” is just another entry in the school’s long list of attempts to boost student attendance in games.
Ateneo could also try the “Student Wednesdays” promo for Lower Box and Patron tickets to see if seat location actually matters. But it is understandable if the school is apprehensive about that idea. Simply put: As long as UAAP Basketball games prove not to be a priority, then Ateneo’s efforts will be for naught.
This is not to say that being selective about which games to see live is wrong or shows a lack of loyalty to the school. In the end, every match-going fan chooses on a basis that is entirely their own. What we need to remember is that before we cry foul on a system supposedly set against us, we need to check if, most of the time, we keep ourselves out of the stadiums.
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