Lucas Gebhart
Sports Editor
Students get into ISU Men’s Basketball games for free, however, after you graduate, you will be paying $17 for an adult ticket for games in Reed Gym.
The only other ticketing option that is cheaper than $17 in Holt Arena is a $12 seat with an obstructed view behind one of the baskets, a seat in which Athletic Director Jeff Tingey admits is not a good place to watch a basketball game.
This season, ISU played nine games in Reed compared to six in Holt.
That $17 ticket is good for the most expensive single-game starting ticket price in the entire conference and the $12 pricing in Holt is good for third behind ISU games in Reed at $17 and Portland State at $14.
It is important to note $17 is also the most expensive ticket one can buy for an ISU game, meaning ISU has really expensive cheap seats and really cheap good seats.
“We don’t consider ourselves the highest or the lowest,” said Erin Joy, a ticketing office employee, adding that ISU ticket pricing for men’s games is about average when one factors in the most expensive ticket pricing as well.
Although Weber State tickets run up to $26 for sitting in the first six rows, one can still get in the gate for just $10. Montana starts ticket pricing at $8 and Eastern Washington is $7.50 after ticket fees.
If you are just looking to get into the event, it is cheaper to go to a Boise State game which starts its ticket pricing at $4. It costs just a dollar and 25 cents more to attend a Utah Jazz game than it does an ISU game, as they run ticket pricing starting at $18.25 on weeknights.
“Seems like I would rather watch the Jazz for $18.25,” said Erica Ingersoll, who got a free ticket from Farm Bureau to the Montana State game. “It is not a very good deal. Seems like a college game should not cost the same as an NBA game.”
One ISU senior who wished to remain anonymous due to close ties to the team said they would not pay $17 to come to a game next season. “It is too much,” the student said, adding that the pricing should be similar to an ISU women’s basketball game with an adult reserved ticket going for $12 and general admission for $8.
According to Joy, Ingersoll is not the only fan who thinks this is not a good deal.
“It is 17 bucks and you’re only seeing basketball is the reaction we usually get,” Joy said. “But when comparing it to $25 or even $30 like some of the other schools at the top of the conference charge, we are still below that.”
Reed does not have a seating chart, meaning you pay $17 regardless of where you sit. Weber State for example, has seats where one can pay $8-10 to sit in the rafters above the basket, $10-12 for the majority of the seating around the middle ring of the arena, and anywhere from $16-26 to sit in the first 20 rows.
ISU does it differently.
“People just kind of sit where they want even though it is reserved seating,” Joy said. “We don’t charge any less or any more to sit closer to the court and we don’t charge any less or any more to sit farther away. It averages out to be about the same price. If they want a specific seat, they are paying for it, if they don’t care, they are at least getting down along the court, but they are not paying more to sit closer.”
Tingey’s explanation was of supply and demand, which is why ticket pricing starts at $17 for games in Reed.
The Montana game on February 25 sold a total of 1,951 as ISU took on first place Montana with conference seeding on the line. With the capacity in Reed at over 3,000, ISU stops selling tickets at 2,700 due to the change in hip size over the last 30 years. That means that 700 tickets went unsold for one of the biggest games of the season. Had the game been in Holt Arena, over 6,000 tickets would have gone unsold.
The Montana State game was closer, but still not a sellout as ISU sold a total of 2,566, a late season game in which ISU would either take sixth or be tied for third. Downtown Dance, who performed at halftime, was in attendance that night and while the dancers got a free ticket, their family members paid $8. If the game was in Holt, over 5,000 would have been unsold.
“Thursday is a difficult one because it is a school night,” Tingey said, adding that it is hard to get the Idaho Falls, Soda Springs and other surrounding markets in the doors.
Despite this, Tingey has not considered lowering ticket prices on Thursdays.
“We try as little as possible to devalue the ticket,” Tingey said. Adding that lowering ticket pricing on Thursday games will devalue the tickets to a point where season ticket holders have less of an incentive to buy season tickets because games will cost less on Thursdays.
“We are trying to protect them and their investment. If you are going to buy one game, one ticket, yeah it is $17. But if you buy a season ticket, that gets drastically reduced,” Tingey explained.
Season tickets cost $148. Over 15 home games that is $9.87 per game. It is rare that one who owns a season ticket will attend all of the home games. Faculty and staff can buy season tickets for even less but their discounts do not count towards single game tickets; they must buy season tickets to take advantages of the discount.
“That is a push that we make and what ticketing outlets, universities and other professional clubs across the board try to do, you’re pushing people to buy season tickets. Come to more games, don’t just come to one,” Tingey said.
According to Joy, there is little fluctuation in season ticket holders. The same bunch come year after year.
This season, ISU does not have any type of promotion pack where one can buy a premium game such as a Weber or Montana but also have to buy a Southern Utah and Northern Arizona to go along with it. There are no mini-packs, no conference packs and no pick three get one free deals. Although, there are various games that had discounted or free tickets and different promotions vary from year to year to allow for variability.
“We have tried that and we haven’t had that great of interest,” Tingey explained, adding that fans don’t have interest in smaller games that go in the promotion pack and they buy just the big game instead.
One of those promotions was a free ticket to the Portland State game where if one went to a Communiversity event the night before, they could pick up a free ticket. ISU gave out over 300 vouchers and 970 used the free ticket the next night.
“We have never gotten that many back before,” Joy said. “If we get 10 percent back we are happy, and we got a lot more than 10 percent.”
Over 30 percent used the free ticket and 2,602 people attended the Portland State game, more than Montana, Weber and Montana State. Joy thinks that the free tickets had a direct impact on the higher attended games that ISU saw throughout the rest of the season. The following Saturday when the Bengals took on Sacramento State, a total of 1,941 tickets were sold; more than the Montana game.
“We saw better attendance for all of our games after that,” Joy said, adding that she thinks the combination of a winning team and the promotion helped get people in the door.
The ticketing office will not be able to confirm next season’s ticket pricing until it is discussed throughout the athletic department. However, with the recent success and the fact that the Bengals will only lose one starter, (Ben Wilson) to graduation, fans may see an increase in ticket pricing. Tingey will have the final say.
