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Offseason Chat: What could make Hard Rock Stadium Better?

gabednconfused said:
I graduated in 2010, we could fill a full student section every game my 4 years, and would fill the upper deck too for big games. My first two years at school we were still in the OB. Student attendance has been downhill ever since from what I see.
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If you’re going to be less than truthful, avoid doing it in front of people that know better. I finished my BS/BA in 09, stuck around for my MBA and JD. The student section has ALWAYS been ****, especially outside of big games. Most people that say “The Student Section was packed” only remember games like FSU or when UF came to town.

They don’t remember the noon kickoffs against UVA or the 330 kickoff against NC State when Miami is barely above .500. Those games were always iffy in regards to attendance, that was true at the OB, it’s true at Hard Rock. I’m fortunate enough to have been part of the sandwich generation, the group that experienced both eras.

The ONLY way you can consistently get students to show up is to 1)WIN and 2) PLAY TEAMS WORTH A **** WEEK IN AND WEEK OUT. The issue is that #2 is impossible because you can’t hand pick your schedule like it’s CFB25 and play half of the Top 10. The school bends over backwards to get students to the games, from providing free transportation to making it extremely easy to get in(no lotteries for most big games, just bring your cane card), the issue is that the student body has changed over the last 20 years and a lot of these kids are just lame as all ****.
 
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One thing I forgot to mention -

I spent two years at UF. The most fun, BY FAR, that I had tailgating while I was there?

The Florida-Georgia game.

Why?

It’s at an NFL stadium, and the tailgating actually makes sense. Tailgating is weird in college towns. It isn’t cohesive, or fun, and it has zero sense of community whatsoever. And it’s a huge pain in the ***.
 
Don't think either are feasible but:
- Stands closer to the field
- Metrorail to make it easier to get there and decrease traffic significantly
 
Canedude08 said:
If you’re going to be less than truthful, avoid doing it in front of people that know better. I finished my BS/BA in 09, stuck around for my MBA and JD. The student section has ALWAYS been ****, especially outside of big games. Most people that say “The Student Section was packed” only remember games like FSU or when UF comes to town.

They don’t remember the noon kickoffs against UVA or the 330 kickoff against NC State when Miami is barely above .500. Those games were always iffy in regards to attendance, they was true at the OB, it’s true at Hard Rock. I’m fortunate enough to have been part of the sandwich generation, the group that experienced both eras.

The ONLY way you can consistently get students to show up is to 1)WIN and 2) PLAY TEAMS WORTH A **** WEEK IN AND WEEK OUT. The issue is that #2 is impossible because you can’t hand pick your schedule like it’s CFB25 and play half of the Top 10. The school bends over backwards to get students to the games, from providing free transportation to making it extremely easy to get in(no lotteries for most big games, just bring your cane card), the issue is that the student body has changed over the last 20 years and a lot of these kids are just lame as all ****.
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Do you know that UF alums say the same thing? They blame the higher SAT scores and GPAs for the lackluster student attendance over the past 10-15 years? Like if you’re smart and good at school, you must not like sports or something. That is absolutely ridiculous and a complete cop out.

And there is no issue unique to UM, as I showed above. Besides, if you go back to the years of the OB when we were at the top, the student section wasn’t packed then either. Hard to pack an entire section when the entire school is less than 5000 students.
 
Brooklyndee said:
I've told Mario I've told echavaria in several other individuals that matter in the equation that DJ needs to be fired first thing smoking that lame *** *** black dude in his cardigan needs to be fired Joe zagacki and his bum *** Don Bailey needs to be fired and then lastly the stadium should be tore down. That's only thing that would make hard rock stadium a better tailgating experience If it just wasn't there. It is a horrible experience for game days and almost all equations. The fans just want to be there to be seen on the jumbotron to get drunk they don't give a s*** about football it's embarrassing honestly. But anyone that thinks tailgating is ever going to be good in Miami is pretty **** delusional. It's a basic experience for a reasons outside of that stadium. If we're going to be compared to college towns anywhere in the country if it's a college town the game day experience the tailgating etc is a billion times better than ours. We can have things pretty rowdy for a bigger games and things like that but the stadium being fired up or full or any of that isn't the same thing as before and after
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Fire everybody and tear down the stadium. I’m sure they appreciated the constructive criticism 🤣🤣
 
Here is the history of UM home attendance through 2013. Overall attendance actually improved at JRS, when one compares season success year to year.
One does have to take into consideration significant home games per year, but in general there is a direct correlation to winning and attendance.

Hurricanes Football: Attendance History

miamihurricanes.com miamihurricanes.com
 
caneingville said:
You are exactly right. And many of those teams are reducing capacity to make their stadiums into a more NFL stadium-like experience, with club-level seats, more suits, etc. They are modeling those college stadiums after our stadium - you know, the one that everyone wants to play in every year in either a NY6 bowl or playoff/championship game. I am sick of everyone denigrating our situation as if our stadium sucks.

The population is aging. People have comfortable living rooms and awesome TVs. Tickets are expensive. These old stadiums suck and are not handicapped-accessible. College towns make you get hotels for a TWO-NIGHT MINIMUM at PREMIUM PRICES. My friend in Gainesville made his b-school tuition both years by subletting his place away game weekends for thousands a weekend.

I would also love everyone in here to go look at the NCAA stats website and see ALL the teams whose attendance we beat last year. Y’all will be surprised. Oregon, Texas Tech, Oklahoma State, Florida State…all behind us in average attendance.

We averaged 59,931 last year. The next group of teams, in the 62-67,000 range, which we should be in this year? Virginia Tech, BYU, Ole Miss, Michigan State, Arkansas, Mizzou, and Washington. We’re really not doing that badly, y’all.

Donate to the program.
Support the kids.
Buy the gear.
Go to the games (if you can).
Quit your **** *****ing.
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Once we get the **** away from Adidas, I will absolutely start buying the gear again. I used to have tons of gear, now all I have left is old **** with holes in it because the Adidas gear is trash and looks and fits terribly.
 
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Zombie-Cane said:
Once we get the **** away from Adidas, I will absolutely start buying the gear again. I used to have tons of gear, now all I have left is old **** with holes in it because the Adidas gear is trash and looks and fits terribly.
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As long as Nike or whomever doesn’t force that $&@&$ clam down our throats again.
And bring back Sebastions pipe, call it medical marijuana if it makes the politically correct drop their wadded panties.
 
caneingville said:
Do you know that UF alums say the same thing? They blame the higher SAT scores and GPAs for the lackluster student attendance over the past 10-15 years? Like if you’re smart and good at school, you must not like sports or something. That is absolutely ridiculous and a complete cop out.

And there is no issue unique to UM, as I showed above. Besides, if you go back to the years of the OB when we were at the top, the student section wasn’t packed then either. Hard to pack an entire section when the entire school is less than 5000 students.
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There has been around 10-11k undergrads for the better part of three decades. Just an FYI. That said, my comment didn’t have anything to do with the increasing stats of incoming classes, it’s more of a cultural change. I came in a highly accomplished student, same as lot of my classmates(Keep in mind, the early 2000s saw a huge jump in the student body because of the generous financial aid packages), the difference was that we were more of a “Work hard, play hard” group. Students were into regular college kid stuff, which also included sports. Over time, it’s become uncool to care about the athletic department at Miami, some of that is because for a significant part of our student body, collegiate sports aren’t a thing where they come from.

Diversity is great and I love that the University reflects the evolving world we live in, but one of the downsides is in regards to athletics. Collegiate athletics is like learning a foreign language, if you don’t start early, it’s really tough to pick it up later. A lot of these students aren’t into it, because they don’t have any exposure to it.
 
Hurracanes said:
1. There are just too many commercials, video games on the Jumbotron, and constant cancer awareness segments that kill any momentum for fans to actually engage with the game.

2. The music is overdone. It ends up drowning out the crowd and makes it feel like we’re supposed to be quiet. And most of the music feels more like we’re at a club than a football game. What happened to the classics like the “Hey Song,” “We Will Rock You,” “Thunderstruck,” or even “Move *****”? Those used to get people hyped.

3. We need to bring back Sebastian from the OB days. The ibis and the band used to play a much bigger role in building the atmosphere. Now Sebastian does the CANES chant once and that’s it. He used to do it two or three times and had more fun bits around the stadium. He should be moving through the crowd and getting everyone involved, not just the student section.

4. Let’s go back to our real pregame traditions. Do more crowd chants like “Orange” and “Green” from both sides of the stadium. That stuff brought energy. People don’t care to show up to pregame because it’s boring as ****.

5. Invest on a bigger band. Think outside the box and get serious in this department. That band is flat out embarrassing.

6. Where all the pop warner football kids? Does Miami not want to look 5 steps ahead and build for the future?

I really wish the athletic department paid more attention to these things. The lack of focus on the little details is disappointing and way overdue.
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Really good points. For the love of god, I can’t imagine why they need to use an entire section of premium seating for a 12 person marching band that nobody can even hear without microphones blasting it through the PA. If that’s the case, just play a recording of the band’s music and use those seats for fans.

They do still give away tickets to the youth football leagues. It’s usually for whatever FCS team is on the schedule or whatever early game against some G5 punching bag. The upper East endzone seats are usually where they sit.
 
gabednconfused said:
Hey CIS-

With another season approaching, I think it's time we get real about the game day experience at Hard Rock Stadium. As much as we all love the Canes, it's no secret that HRS doesn’t give off the energy or atmosphere that college football is known for—and it’s hurting the game day experience (IMO).

Between the long distance from campus, the sterile NFL vibe, and bum tailgating rules, it’s just not stacking up to what you see at schools like LSU, Michigan, or even FSU (ugh). The thing is—we’re not helpless. I am sure the AD wants fans in the stands and creating noise. So what if we put our heads together and came up with a list of practical, realistic ideas to help make things better this fall?

I'm planning to compile the best suggestions and send them to the AD or someone involved with stadium ops.

Here are a few prompts to get the conversation going:
  • How do we get more students to games? (None of them attend anymore, which is WILD)
  • What tailgating fixes are actually doable?
  • Can we get an on-site uber lot for those who didn't drive? (Currently have to walk to Walmart to catch an uber)
  • What makes other schools’ gamedays better—and how can we copy it?
  • What in-stadium improvements would help atmosphere and energy?
  • Is there a way to make parts of HRS feel more “ours” (banners, traditions, lighting, music)?
One example I was thinking was the seat color- because its teal, on TV it looks like 12 people showed up when we played Duke. Could just put green t-shirts over the seats for the fans to hide the seats and more match typical fan colors (or orange or white etc...)

Go Canes 🤙
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Turn down the temperature about 20 degrees in sept and oct
 
In general the Media timeouts help to kill the environment. We’ve shortened game action and kept game length similar.

going to a game is a chore even if you’re not a tailgater. for an average or casual fan it’s a cost benefit for both time/money. I can sit at home and watch on my big screen, in an air conditioned environment and not spend 5-7 hours of my day to watch us play a lackluster game vs USF.

Win and play big opponents and it will feel better.
 
DTP said:
I think the people who cry about an on campus stadium have never actually been to a game at an on campus stadium.

Just getting in/out of campus on a game day is a nightmare. There’s no big parking lot outside the football stadium so that usually means you’re tailgating outside the arts and sciences building or other random spot that’s a half mile walk to the stadium.

Once you’re in, you sit on some rusty bleachers where the fat guy behind you keeps kneeing you in the back because your seat doesn’t have a back. The NCAA relaxed rules on selling alcohol so at least now you can get a beer at most colleges but for decades, you couldn’t. These stadiums are old. Even when they do renovations it’s usually just adding luxury boxes or another level of ****** bleachers. They don’t actually make the stadium experience better for a majority of the people there.

Miami’s attendance is what it is. Big games sell out. FCS teams get 40,000 or less. They could give away tickets to those games and the stadium would still have a bunch of empty seats. They actually do give away a ton of seats to youth football leagues for those games. Maybe they could go independent and just schedule a top 25 team every week and people would show up but that’s just not realistic.

I honestly don’t think there’s a way that they can expect 65,000 people to show up for non marquee games. We just don’t have the fanbase. Very few teams have the fans to sell out 80,000+ seats every week. We were 26th notionally in a year where the top home games were a 2-10 FSU team and 6-7 Virginia Tech. With Florida and Notre Dame on the schedule this year it should put us over 60,000 average for the first time since like 2002.
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MiamisMoperiestMopes said:
In general the Media timeouts help to kill the environment. We’ve shortened game action and kept game length similar.

going to a game is a chore even if you’re not a tailgater. for an average or casual fan it’s a cost benefit for both time/money. I can sit at home and watch on my big screen, in an air conditioned environment and not spend 5-7 hours of my day to watch us play a lackluster game vs USF.

Win and play big opponents and it will feel better.
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Agree with some of this, but no one has shortened the game action. There are more plays per game than ever.
 
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Average of plays per game per team. (Average of averages!!)
2024- 68.5
2023- 68.9
2022- 69.3
2021- 70.6
2019- 71.13
2018- 72.13

Average of the top 50 plays per game teams
2024- 72.9
2023- 73.7
2022- 75.4
2021- 75.3
2019- 75.4
2018- 77.1

College Football Stats - College FB Team Plays per Game | TeamRankings.com

College Football plays per game, by team.
www.teamrankings.com www.teamrankings.com

The numbers are down. The clock runs. 🤷‍♂️
 
Improving the team's entrance onto the field would go a long way. That was a major part of the experience and mystique at the OB, and we've lost that completely while other teams continue to copy our smoke entrance. Lose the fire towers and construct some sort of tube-shaped apparatus the team can run through.
 
NCCanefan said:
Agree with some of this, but no one has shortened the game action. There are more plays per game than ever.
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Average total plays per game is down about 5 since they changed the clock stoppage rules after the 2022 season.

It’s way down from the 80’s. They used to stop the clock after every down and teams would regularly run 80-85 offensive plays per game. And that was before teams ran the no huddle outside of the two minute drill
 
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