What will it take to fill the CU Events Center?
The fan experience at CU Events Center has long been a hot button topic. It went from a packed house to watch Ceal Barry coached teams in the 1990s to a virtually empty arena for games in the 2000s.
When Nate Tomlinson arrived at Colorado in 2008, the basketball team was not popular. The football team, although in decline, was still the talk of the town, and the hoops team was on the backburner.
“When I came in in 2008, things were pretty dire for the basketball program to say the best,” Tomlinson said. “But actually my mom sent a photo of this year's anniversary of my first game at CU and she sent a picture and I was like, ‘Holy cow there’s like 500 people in the stands,’ so it's kind of a reality check in there.”
When Tad Boyle was hired in 2010, the basketball program got a much-needed boost and began to rise from obscurity. The Buffaloes went 24-14 in Boyle’s first year at the helm. They beat a ranked Kansas State team in the Big 12 quarterfinals and took No. 2 Kansas to the brink in the semifinals.
The program was revitalized. In Tomlinson’s senior season, the first year in the Pac-12, he finally got to play against soldout crowds at the CU (Coors) Events Center.
“And then there was a picture I got sent of one of my senior year games that we're using for recruiting and I was like, wow, I mean, that's what I remember it as,” Tomlinson said. “And then there's been everything in between all that so to the point of where we are today is kind of a little bit of both.”
After a professional career in Australia, Tomlinson joined Boyle’s staff in 2018. Much of the allure that Boyle had brought originally was beginning to fade. There were games, especially in the non-conference portion, where CU was lucky to have half the arena filled.
With the Buffs being ranked in the top 25 for most of the season this past year, the fans started to fill up the events center once again.
CU sold out three of their home games this past season: Oregon, Stanford and UCLA. The latter two drew crowds that hadn’t been seen in ‘The Keg’ since the 2015-16 season.
But there were still games, especially ones in the middle of the week, where the crowds left a lot to be desired. Tomlinson, along with many Buffs fans, has dreams of becoming a school that sells out all of its men’s basketball games.
“From Rick George all the way down to me, we just want to make the experience the most fun and pleasurable that there is in college basketball because I really believe we can do that here in Boulder,”
So Tomlinson, on April 1, reached out to fans via Twitter to see what sort of suggestions they had to make the fan experience more enjoyable.
“Just wanting to know what motivates them, what gets the Colorado fanbase kicking,” Tomlinson said. “What matters to them? At the end of the day we don't have jobs unless we have fans, that's just the bottom line. So trying to make the experience, as best we can, the best possible experience for two hours anywhere in the country in any college basketball arena.”
What Tomlinson learned may be obvious but can get overlooked. It’s the little things such as the parking and traffic heading into the arena. Or the concession stand. Or what music they are playing and the other forms of fan entertainment. And yes, of course, winning.
“Yeah, I mean winning, that's obvious, everyone wants to do that. But people will be in the stands before the result of the game. I don't think that really makes too much sense,” Tomlinson said. “Everything you can think of was in there. From as far as getting to the game like parking and all those sorts of things. And then the game music and concession stands literally everything you can think of.”
They have already gone to work trying to put in place some of the suggestions.
“We actually have a zoom meeting tomorrow with some of the athletic department to talk about these things,” Tomlinson said. “So it's actually coming to a head and I thank all the people that did reach out, even though it is a pretty unprofessional and open canvas thing on Twitter. But that's that's sometimes what it takes. And those are the real people that come to the game.”
With the players the Buffaloes have coming back, and the expectations the coaching staff have put on themselves, it is time to fill the keg once again.
