The construction of Chaifetz Arena on campus is a step that Saint Louis University has taken toward creating a more respectable basketball program. But with the new arena comes a new ticket distribution process.
In past years, the tickets have been distributed based on a “lottery” system, where the students are chosen at random for which seats they will hold in the Scottrade Center.
When the new arena is finished, however, the distribution process will change. The student section has 1,000 seats set aside with 250 of them going to the school’s pep band in a staduim with a capacity of 10,600.
Of the 750 remaining tickets offered, 500 will go to the students with the most priority points, which students earn by going to other SLU athletic events during the fall season. The other 250 will go back to the lottery system, where those students with more priority points will have their names in the lottery more times than those with fewer points.
“We presented this proposition to Student Government [Association] a few weeks ago, and the main thing we want to do with this new system is to encourage students to get more involved,” said Director of Ticket Sales and Operations Andrew Doeschot. “There’s a lot of student apathy with athletics on campus, so we want to generate student excitement for what’s happening on campus.”
SGA is currently putting together a survey to gain student perspective on some of the new aspects of the arena. The survey will address issues such as student attendance in previous years, student attendance this year because of Rick Majerus and which seating options students prefer.
“We think that we can get more students to attend basketball games,” SGA senator Patrick Devney said. “With the survey, we’re trying to get some real data and information to back it up when we go to the administration requesting improvements like 150-200 more seats.”
The survey will also include what students think of the cost of a season ticket at $135 for 18 games. Devney said the cost is reasonable since none of the students’ tuition dollars is going toward the arena.
“If we’re asking students how they feel about the seats and new coach, we’d like to give the whole picture and ask what they think of ticket prices as well,” Devney said. “It’s not cheap, considering games are free right now, but we’re trying to put it into perspective since no tuition dollars were used.”
SGA President Andrew Clifton said that he is worried basketball attendance will be lower this year because of the new seating and ticket distribution process.
“Our fear is that the percentage of student seating is at the low end,” Clifton said. “This [survey] is an attempt to see what the demand will be like. We don’t want a lot of upset students who can’t go to the arena.”
Doeschot said that much research went into finding the right price for the tickets. There are schools that have lower prices and schools that have higher ones, but he said that he is confident that SLU made a nice compromise on the price.
“We really wanted to avoid adding a fee to the students who weren’t going to be taking advantage of [the new arena],” Doeschot said. “We all know that students are kind of short on money, but for 10 dollars a night, it is not that bad of an entertainment option.”
Senior Steve Nagel, who is president of the club soccer team and an active Legion 1818 member, said that he has several different ways of looking at the new system.
“As a senior, I’m not going to go to many of the games, but as an athletic trainer, I prefer to work with the athletes on the court,” Nagel said. “From a legion’s perspective, yeah, I love that because I go to pretty much every soccer game and a bunch of the women’s games. If I were younger, I would probably want to get involved more because all my friends are going.”
Other students, such as club lacrosse player Jeff Orbe, disagree with the new system. He said it is almost extortion, considering a student has to go to games in the fall in order to earn basketball tickets.
“People don’t really care much about the sports in the fall and only want to go to basketball games,” Orbe said. “I don’t see why they necessarily need to change the system because I don’t think they are going to sell out the arena. They need to give more seats to the students, because we’ll be rowdier and give more support than other people. Plus, when every other sport on campus is free, why are students going to want to pay for a ticket for basketball?”
