Only 5 sellouts in Henderson Center history?

[marshallmark]

Last Saturday, Mitch Vingle penned a column that discussed attendance at WVU and Marshall basketball. One comment caught my eye about games at the Henderson Center:


"The Cam Henderson Center holds 9,048. Back in 1984-85 it held average crowds of 8,539. But since the arena opened there have only been five capacity crowds." http://www.wvgazette.com/article/20150117/GZ02/150119286/1147[/URL]
I asked Mitch about that information, and he very quickly pointed me to Marshall's own site @ http://www.herdzone.com/facilities/mars-cam-henderson.html that does, indeed, note that the Henderson Center has only had 5 sell-outs.

Here's my question -- I went to all 5 WVU games at the arena, and am positive that there were no available seats. I recall at least two Memphis games that, I thought, sold out and MU's own website notes that the record crowd was for a game vs. The Citadel. Am I misremembering, or is the MU site wrong?

 

[Herdmeister]

Yes, The Citadel was the largest crowd ever. It can't be topped since we have about 1,000 less seats now than then.

 

[marshallmark]

Originally posted by Herdmeister:
Yes, The Citadel was the largest crowd ever. It can't be topped since we have about 1,000 less seats now than then.

That wasn't the question. I understand that's the record, and it certainly is one of the sellouts -- my question is: is it correct that there were only 4 others? What about the WVU and Memphis games?

 

[bbneutralfan]

Well mark one thing is for certain. There will not be any sellouts this season!

 

[Gochneaur645]

I think UCF in 2011 was a sellout too.

 

[Thunder93]

The 1988 NIT game against VCU was a definite sellout. we were packed like sardines in the upper deck!

 

[marshallmark]

You know, I was there too and I distinctly recall that it was NOT a sell-out. About 500 short if my memory is correct.

I agree that the UCF glow-stick game was a sell-out too.

I've asked Aaron Goebbel to get involved. lol

 

[sistersville]

I was at the 1988 game. Our last BIG GAME?

 

[-Olen-]

Originally posted by marshallmark:
You know, I was there too and I distinctly recall that it was NOT a sell-out. About 500 short if my memory is correct.

I agree that the UCF glow-stick game was a sell-out too.

I've asked Aaron Goebbel to get involved. lol

Under the HC's original design and capacity (10,250 -- 1981-1998), the Butterfly was sold-out six times: Dec. 1981 (10,250 v. WVU); Dec. 1983 (10,573 v. WVU); Feb. 1984 (10,484 v. Davidson); Feb. 1984 (10,705 v. Citadel); Dec. 1985 (10,502 v. WVU); Dec. 1987 (10,576 v. WVU). The HC had attendance top 10,000 another 8 times without selling-out.

The reconfiguration in 1998 reduced capacity to 9,043, which the Herd has reached at least once (Jan. 2008 v. Memphis - 9,043). The UCF glowstick game (March 2011) fell seven tickets short at 9,036. IIRC, there may have been one additional sell-out since 1998-99, but I cannot find any box scores at this moment to verify that.

So, Vingle was off by 2 -- the HC has been sold-out 7 times (at least).

 

[thundermax]

And I believe it was sold out when OJ Mayo and company played there too

 

[wlfry]

Yea back then basketball was fun,before Lee Moon killed it. We were ranked apx. 14th in the country in attendance ,amazing, considering the size of school and arena.

 

[herdalicious]

Originally posted by marshallmark:
Last Saturday, Mitch Vingle penned a column that discussed attendance at WVU and Marshall basketball.

Actually, the article didn't discuss WVU's attendance at all, and the dig at Marshall's attendance seemed to come completely out of left field (seriously, how is that newsworthy?).

Also, it was published in Sunday's (not Saturday) Gazette - a day after WVU suffered a blowout loss to Texas, but I'm sure that is completely coincidental.

*COUGH*



This post was edited on 1/20 7:24 PM by herdalicious

 

[marshallmark]

You must have been reading a different article. I do not know when it appeared in print, but it clearly was posted online on Saturday. Also, he did in fact talk about WVU's attendance:

"If you're wondering, WVU is averaging 9,194 fans to the Coliseum this season. That will rise because the TCU game is already a sellout.

WVU averaged 8,575 last season (17-16 record); 8,752 in 2012-13 (13-19); 9,930 in 2011-12 (19-14); 11,419 in 2010-11 (21-12) and 12,377 in 2009-10 (31-7)."

 

[Tim Hensley]

What about that 5-degree Saturday night when we had 10,000 out to see VMI play? Think that was during the Gay Elmore era.