Wow, I’m going to miss the continuing “soap opera” of Memphis Tigers hoops! 
[b][b]Calipari puzzled by U of M attendance report to NCAA Use of actual figure causes big drop in ranking[/b]By Gary Parrish
Memphis Commercial-Appeal
June 25, 2005When the NCAA recently released its final attendance figures for last basketball season, the University of Memphis ranked 48th nationally and out of the top 10 for the first time in five years.
Why?
In short, somebody messed up.
“I don’t know why we did this to ourselves,” said Tiger coach John Calipari. “I’m dumbfounded.”
Calipari’s frustration stems from the fact that UofM officials inexplicably reported “actual” attendance to the NCAA rather than tickets sold or paid attendance.
The Tigers averaged 9,586 real people for home games at FedExForum last season. But the tickets-sold number – the number most, if not all, other institutions use – was closer to 15,000, meaning Memphis would’ve again ranked in the top 10 had it only reported the figure it’s always reported in the past.
Instead, the Tigers barely made the top 50, and were outdrawn – at least according to the rankings – by such schools as Creighton and Wichita State, something that isn’t good for the national image Calipari is forever trying to establish.
“Did any other school not report tickets sold? No,” Calipari said. “So what are we trying to prove? Why would we do it this way? I have no idea. I just don’t know why we wouldn’t present the picture the best way we could, and the same way everybody else does.”
Asked if he’d try to rectify the situation, or talk to UofM officials about the mishap, Calipari was short.
“No,” he answered. “I (just) coach the basketball team.”
Still, Calipari did see some good that can potentially come out of this.
“For this next year, when we do it the right way and report tickets sold, we will have the biggest increase in attendance in the nation,” he said with a smile. “Maybe we did it like this for that reason. But I really don’t know.”
Not as bad as it looks
The University of Memphis’s men’s basketball attendance appears to have dropped dramatically last season. But, in reality, the decline was caused by the UofM reporting actual attendance to the NCAA in 2004-05, instead of tickets sold as it had in the past:
Season / Attendance / Rank
'00-01 / 17,110 / sixth
'01-02 / 16,225 / 10th
'02-03 / 16,643 / seventh
'03-04 / 15,432 / 10th
'04-05 / 9,586 / 48th[/b]
Link: Calipari puzzled by U of M attendance report to NCAA
Also, from another story, surprising stats about how many U of M students actually attend games:
[b]The loyalty section will be in Sections 117 and 118. It is formerly part of the student section, which has now been cut to about 2,200 seats, a number still roughly 1,700 more than the average number of students who attended games last season. [/b]Link: [url=http://www.commercialappeal.com/mca/tigers_mens_basketball/article/0,1426,MCA_652_3893405,00.html]Moves made to quell forum seating gripes[/url]
If I’m reading that correctly, only 500 students on average attended Memphis home games in 04-05. That’s pitiful!