Attendance in rain encourages local officials

Friday night's NCAA Football Championship Subdivision title game at Finley Stadium was the first with Merrill Eckstein as Finley's operator and Scott Smith instead of Eckstein as president of the Greater Chattanooga Sports & Events Committee.

It rained on their parade, but they didn't come away soaked.

"A few of the local people who bought tickets stayed away, but the side of the stadium that was shown on TV looked good except for the corners," Smith said. "The home side didn't look too bad. It looked pretty good overall considering the weather."

Friday's paid attendance of 14,328 was the lowest FCS title crowd since 2003, when 14,281 watched Delaware blank Colgate. Montana and Villanova combined to bring 3,677 fans, which was the smallest number of visitors since the event came to Chattanooga in 1997.

A record 10,651 tickets were sold locally, and Eckstein estimated the actual attendance between 12,500 and 13,000.

"Some people at decision time saw it raining and figured they could just stay home and watch it on television," Eckstein said, "but I don't think that number was too large."

The most notable aspect affected by the weather occurred before kickoff, when the Air Force's popular Wings of Blue parachuting display was canceled due to fog cover. Eckstein said six were scheduled to jump.

Smith and Eckstein believe the local response will bode well for late February, when Chattanooga and the Dallas suburb of Frisco make their presentations to the NCAA regarding the 2010-12 title games. According to Smith's records, the local attendance at the 1997 title game was 8,180 but had dipped to 6,160 by '02.

Though the overall crowd was the fourth smallest in the 13 years at Finley, Eckstein does not believe it will result in a significant financial hit to the Stadium Corp. He said the two main revenue sources are concessions and parking and that the 1,000-plus parking spaces always are sold for crowds in excess of 10,000.

"When I was preparing the budget, what I wasn't counting on was more than 50,000 Mocs fans showing up," Eckstein said, "so UTC's attendance had a much larger effect than tonight's game. We have a chance to break even for the fiscal year, which ends June 30, and there was no way I would have dreamed of what the Mocs did.

"Thank you, Russ Huesman," he said in reference to the first-year UTC coach.

Friday's announced crowd was the largest this year at Finley, topping the 14,002 who attended UTC's win Sept. 3 over Glenville State.