Purdue 18th in Average Attendance Nationwide

Earlier today, the NCAA released Men’s Basketball attendance numbers for all divisions, and once again the Big Ten Conference led the way in overall and national attendance:

You can see the full list of attendance figures here, but for now I will break down the numbers for Purdue.

Purdue saw a total home attendance of 234,930 during the 2016-17 season, a decrease from the total home attendance of 245,916 the previous season. However, Purdue had 17 homes games (not counting exhibitions) during the 2016-17 season, whereas they had 18 home games (not counting exhibitions) the previous season. This places Purdue’s average home attendance at 13,819, an increase from 13,662 the previous season. With a capacity of 14,804, Mackey averaged a 93.3% capacity this season with 6 sell-outs.

Purdue’s average home attendance was the 18th highest in the country, up from 20th the season before, and 6th in the Big Ten with Wisconsin (17,286), Maryland (16,628), Indiana (16,363), Nebraska (15,427), and Michigan State (14,797) ahead of Purdue.

When factoring in all of Purdue’s games (home, away, and neutral), Purdue had a total attendance of 478,834, 10th overall in the nation and 3rd in the Big Ten with Wisconsin (556,252) and Indiana (501,269) ahead of Purdue.

It will be interesting to see how Purdue’s attendance changes this upcoming season after losing Caleb Swanigan, as well as facing a not-so appealing home schedule without our rivals from the south venturing to West Lafayette.