Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl Actually Fights Interest in Bowl Games

The Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl is hosted in the beautiful AT&T Park in San Francisco, home to the San Francisco Giants and featuring scenic views of the San Francisco bay.  It’s been played there since 2002 and has previously been named the Emerald Bowl, San Francisco Bowl, and the Diamond Walnut San Francisco Bowl.

Last year’s matchup featuring a 13-1 Nevada Wolfpack team, fresh off an upset of previously undefeated Boise State and ranked 13th in the season ending poll against a 7-5 Boston College team.  The University of Nevada is 4 hours from San Francisco, and thus, it’s not overly surprising that they managed to sell not just their 11,000 ticket allotment but an additional 4,369 tickets on top of those and were told they would receive no more tickets.  Boston College was actually pleading fans to buy their tickets so they could give them for free to local charities.   Yikes.  Regardless, the game had 41,063 people in attendance.

Fast forward to this year where the bowl featured a matchup between 6-6 Illinois that hadn’t won in 12 weeks and had fired their coach at midseason and 6-7 UCLA (6 hour drive) that was fresh off a stomping at USC and a blowout against Oregon in the Pac 12 championship.  Not only that, UCLA had to plead the NCAA for a special exemption to even get into the bowl game.  As of Dec 30th, the day before the game, Illinois had moved under 2,000 of their 8,000 ticket allotment, and UCLA wasn’t making these figures available.  It’s fair to assume that UCLA’s were going better, but still not well.  Maybe after having to beg to get in, they didn’t want to admit they couldn’t find paydirt.

Attendance at the game clocked in at 29,878, a drop of 11,185 from the previous year.  That’s a 27% drop, but who’s counting?

The Fight Hunger Bowl wasn’t even the worst stink bomb of this bowl season.

The Poinsettia Bowl is hosted in beautiful San Diego, California.  Last year, a matchup between San Diego State, a solid team that defines “local”, and Navy in a strong Navy city drew over 48,000.  This year, a matchup between two teams from halfway across the country, Louisiana Tech and a slightly down TCU, drew 24,600.  For those doing their math at home, that’s an astounding nearly 50% drop.

So what’s going on here?

1. Matchups matter.  Throwing together any old teams and charging whatever you feel like for tickets won’t necessarily attract crowds, especially when all the games are live on ESPN in HD.
2. More people may be electing to stay at home and watch on TV.  Nothing gets better coverage on TV than the college football bowl season.  Let’s say you’re a TCU fan considering a trip to San Diego.  If you’re not excited about this matchup, wouldn’t you strongly consider just staying in Texas and watching on TV with some fellow alums?
3. Travel and a down economy are a rough mix.  People can seem to stomach a short drive to see their favorite team, but when you’re asking them to fly across the country to play in a game that’s supposed to be an “honor” against a mostly invisible Louisiana Tech team or, frankly, an embarrassing UCLA team, fans just aren’t going to make the trip.

But for their efforts, they sustained a loss to a pitiful Illinois team, likely lost money on the experience, and in all likelihood, inspired exactly no one to consider attending UCLA.  Except for maybe Jim Mora Jr.  But let’s be honest, he’s just hoping to get an NFL gig again and would have accepted the job at TC Williams High School if Denzel Washington didn’t have that job already.  He’s still looking at the Miami Sharks position, if Al Pacino decides to quit due to old age.  Maybe he can be coach in waiting.

The athletic department wanted to avoid a 2 year bowl drought, which would have been the first two year bowl drought at UCLA since 1997.  In fact, they’ve only missed 3 bowls since 1997.  Since Athletic Director Dan Guerrero started at UCLA in 2002, the man who said this was for the seniors, the Bruins have missed two bowl games.  Missing in 2008 and 2010 with 4-8 records, Dan had to take the opportunity to sneak into the bowl game this year.  With a new hire coming in mid December and a bowl appearance, albeit a shoddy one, Dan can sell that the program is going in a positive direction.  Don’t forget that the previously dominant basketball program has also been decidedly average the past few seasons.