Expansion By The Numbers 7: Football Stadium Size

October 2nd, 2011 04:27 PM║ Posted By: John Pennington ║ Permalink ║ Schools: Alabama, Arkansas, Auburn, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, LSU, Mississippi State, Ole Miss, South Carolina, Tennessee, Vanderbilt
Tags: Football Stadium Capacity, SEC, Texas Tech, Virginia Tech

When it comes to the Southeastern Conference, football is king. Oh, sure, when the league is looking at potential expansion partners basketball and Olympic sports matter on some (much smaller) level. But football is where the money is. And money — specifically the money from football-related network television packages — is driving expansion.

This Category: Football Stadium Size

Why: The easiest way to judge a school’s commitment to football is by judging how big and how nice its stadium is. Since “nice” is a relative term, we’ll look at size only.

The easiest way to judge a fanbase’s passion for football — and it better be high if a school wants to be a cultural fit with the SEC — is to see how many seats a school has built for its backers. Again, size matters.

Now, do we believe a school will rise or fall on an SEC wish list because of stadium size? No. League presidents won’t be passing around comparisons of seating charts the next time they get together for a chat.

However, league administrators have often spoken of finding a cultural fit for their league. ”Cultural fit” is a rather amorphous topic. It’s immeasurable. Stadium size is one way for us to measure something that at least relates to the football-crazy nature of a school and its fans. It allows us to measure the immeasurable.

Below are the stadium capacity numbers for each of the 35 schools we’ve been comparing in this series. While I’m sure a few folks will claim that their school’s stadium can fit even more with standing-room-only tickets, we’re sticking with the following official numbers.

Rank	School	Football Stadium Capacity
1	Penn State	106,572
2	Texas	101,624
3	Texas A&M	82,600
4	Florida State	82,300
5	Oklahoma	82,112
6	Clemson	81,500
7	Notre Dame	80,795
8	Miami	74,916*
9	Missouri	71,004
10	Virginia Tech	66,233
11	S. Florida	65,647*
12	Pittsburgh	65,050*
13	N. Carolina	62,980
14	Virginia	61,500
15	W. Virginia	60,540
16	Texas Tech	60,454
17	Oklahoma State	60,218
18	NC State	57,583
19	Louisville	56,000
20t	Georgia Tech	55,000
20t	Iowa State	55,000
22	Maryland	54,000
23	Rutgers	52,454
24	Kansas State	52,200
25	Kansas	50,071
26t	Baylor	50,000
26t	E. Carolina	50,000
28	Syracuse	49,262
29	Boston College	44,500
30	TCU	44,008
31	Connecticut	40,000
32	Cincinnati	35,000
33	Navy	34,000
34	Duke	33,941
35	Wake Forest	31,500

* Schools marked with an asterisk play in an off-campus facility that is also home to a professional team. That just doesn’t fit the SEC profile.

* Those schools with capacities over 80,000 — Penn State, Texas, A&M, FSU, Oklahoma, Notre Dame and Clemson — they are SEC-caliber in terms of fan passion.

* Are you surprised t0 find that Missouri has a bigger football stadium than Virginia Tech?

* Schools with stadiums seating less than 50,000 had better have some serious basketball clout, because serious football schools have larger facilities.

For the sake of comparison, the numbers for current SEC stadiums are as follows:

Rank	School	Football Stadium Capacity
1	Tennessee	102,455
2	Alabama	101,821
3	Georgia	92,746
4	LSU	92,542
5	Florida	88,548
6	Auburn	87,541
7	S. Carolina	80,250
8	Arkansas	76,000
9	Kentucky	67,606
10	Ole Miss	60,580
11	Miss. State	55,082
12	Vanderbilt	39,790

* All told, the 12 SEC stadiums feature a combined seating capacity of 944,871.

* The average stadium size in the SEC is 78,739. Take out Vanderbilt and the average jumps to 82,280.

* Kentucky may be thought of as a basketball school, but the Wildcats’ Commonwealth Stadium is bigger than the facilities at Virginia Tech, North Carolina, West Virginia, Texas Tech and Oklahoma State.

In Part 8 of our series on SEC expansion, we’ll look at athletic success.

UPDATE — Clemson’s 2011 media guide lists its official stadium capacity as 81,500 after a recent expansion project. The chart above has been updated.

« SEC Headlines 10/2/2011 Part Three

Report: UF’s Brantley To Miss LSU Game »

42 comments

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Bill

If Kentucky had the right leadership in place, they could compete with anyone. To label them as a basketball school just isn't correct.

Phil

These articles are interesting but I don't think they are what Conference's are looking at. If these are supposed to be strategic moves then CEO's would be smart to look at growth trends. I would be really interested into seeing which schools provide the best potential for growth athletically and academically. I think those lists would greatly differ from what is the current status quo of the lists provided. BTW, I like your stuff Mr. SEC.

Aggieclassof87

Texas A&M will expand there Stadium after the 2013 season adding a South End zone. Kyle field will then be between 95K and 100K. Per 12th man foundation

UofA72

What are season ticket prices at A&M? I know the cheap seats at Arkanss are $55 for SEC games ($45 for the rent-a-wins). Other SEC schools are higher, and some may be lower. A&M staff probably already knows what all the SEC prices are, and are calculating any potential increase into their plan.

If Kyle is selling out now, A&M will probably need those new seats soon because SEC fans travel well. It's always great when the visitors help pay for your expansion.

Walter

My season tickets this year (in the Top Deck of the End Zone) were $500 per seat, for 7 games, so around $70 per game, we're expecting the prices to rise with the increased quality of opponents being brought in by joining the SEC.

There has long been a rumor that a donor had promised a very large donation (most of the rumors put it in the 3 digits of millions) donation to fund a stadium expansion / renovation if they joined the SEC. Inside sources have replied that the donation has been affirmed since the announcement, but we still haven't seen anything official on what the number is.

The size of the expansion hasn't been determined yet, there are apparently a couple of different approaches, including tearing down both sides and rebuilding everything except the relatively new endzone (referred to as the Zone), to a renovation and expansion in place.

UofA72

Hope all that comes about for A&M. Improvements to any of the "13" is good for all of them. Also hope you win every game this year, unless we play you in a bowl game somehere.

I worked with several A&M grads while in Dallas for 15 years. Good people, every one of them. You're going to experience some major differences compared to what you've had for the last 100 years. Thanks for the Info and welcome to the SEC.

kfhonline

Hey Mr. SEC,

Do you know if any of the current SEC teams are currently expanding their stadiums, or if there are definite plans by any team to do so?

Thanks and GREAT work on providing info about the expansion "rumors" and facts.

kfhonline

OK all the ECU fans.

Someone had posted earlier that ECU was expanding it's stadium by 7800 seats which would make their stadium old 57,800. Will someone confirm that the stadium has been expanded, or are there actual plans to increase the size of the stadium.

jack

The attendence for the last game was 50,600. 600 standing room only seats.

Stan Cardwell

I would be interested to know how many seats are allotted for the visiting team in the SEC? If an SEC school is expected to bring 10-15K fans to an away game, that changes the dynamic - attendance numbers and stadium size.

The huge schools (over 100K) stand on their own. All those in the 60K range are growing, declining or staying put. But Joining the SEC so skews the growth factors that I would expect growth from any that have room to add-on to their stadium (and THAT objective NUMBER may be a good point of research for this column)

UofA72

I've commented along these lines several times on other articles on this site. I don't remember the exact numbers, but it was a big deal when Arkansas left the SWC for the SEC. The guaranteed visitor seats went from around 2000 to somewhere between 8,000 and 10,000 Exept for Texas and A&M those 2000 were weldom sold out. The visiting team allotment may be higher now. That was almost 20 years ago.

Arkansas' stadium capacity was about 51,000 at that time, and last year the Alabama game attendance was 76,808. In addition, my season ticket prices went from $30 per game to $75 (counting the required athletic fund donation) since joing the SEC. Phase I of a 2 phase plan was completed a few years ago. Phase II, sometime in the future when needed, would add about 5000 more seats.

These aren't official numbers, except for the prices and the 76,808 attendance. They are just my best recollection.

Stan Cardwell

i think stadium size is a good indicator (at least it is objective), but also know it must be seen as dynamic - (but how do you measure that?). Take for instance Arkansas that upgraded immensely after joining the SEC. WVU had a capacity of 65K before adding luxury suites, but can expand again if given the opportunity. strikes against them - playing in the Big East where fans don't travel. The extra money that comes from joining the SEC makes upgrades possible. The increase in fan interest at the level of SEC competition will fill up Mountaineer field over the likes of UConn and Rutgers and Syracuse. We turned away 5K students for the LSU game.

Rob

I'm not questioning anything here, but just wanted to say that I don't think fan enthusiasm can be measured by seats. Maybe you can measure fan size by seats, but you can have a small, but very enthusiastic, fan base.

Several of the schools on this list are examples of this and I'll point to WV as an example. The Mountaineers are known to have great fans, but they represent a state with only 1.5M people or so. Personally, I'd rather go to a game @WV then @Miami, because of this, despite that Miami has the larger stadium.

Bubba Gump

That was my point in listing attendance numbers over stadium size. Look at theses two schools

8Miami74,916*
9Missouri71,004

Problem is if you use their actual attendance averages then Missouri drops down around Oklahoma States numbers, and Miami drops down closer to Uconn's numbers. Virginia Tech has a smaller stadium than Miami or Missouri, but Va Tech makes the top 25 in attendance year after year when neither Miami or Missouri do. Schools like South Carolina and Kentucky sell their seats no matter how bad the team is, but Miami only sells well when they are doing well.

Nebraska is a small population state similar to West Virginia, but they have a strong history of winning that allows them to support an 81,000 seat venue. They currently hold the record for consecutive sellouts going back to 1962, and West Virginia does not have that 50 years of capacity for their program. West Virginia might be at peak capacity, but Virginia Tech may be able to go to 75K or 85K and still fill the seats. Reading between the line here it looks like MrSEC is hinting that the bar for the next SEC add will be a school that can support 80,000 seats. Miami, Missouri, and West Virginia just do not seem like they could maintain the 80K mark and compete at the current and future SEC levels.

HomerU

I don't buy the whole argument over South Carolina being too small for recruting for two SEC schools. There is a lot of football talent in South Carolina, but unfortunately a lot do not quality academically to get into Clemson so South Carolina tends to win recruits in that regard. Clemson has been very successful at recruiting in Florida, Georgia, Virginia, and North Carolina. They have won out going head-to-head at times with SEC schools for quality players. Since going to the SEC recruting has improved for USCe, but if you compare recruiting rankings between the two schools I think Clemson is still outpacing them.

johnmrsec

Rob and Bubba Gump...

First, if someone can find a way to measure "enthusiasm," we'll use it. But we're trying to go by the simplest numbers possible to avoid debate (yet people still debate every number we post).

Second, we didn't use attendance numbers because those are ridiculously skewed. I've sat in stadiums with 20,000 empty seats that were officially announced as being "full."

Seats is the simplest way to judge how a school views its own fan support.

Thanks for reading the site,
John

Bubba Gump

Some thoughts,

on the bottom schools in the SEC
Kentucky => tho considered a basketball school, always in the top 25 in attendance every season
Mississippi State => often sold out, and an expansion to 75,000 on the drawing board

on schools not currently in the SEC
The Big 12 was really the Big 4 (Texas, TAMU, Oklahoma, and Nebraska) and everybody else. Many of the other Big 12 schools have much smaller stadiums which have historically fallen well below listed capacity. All other Big 12 schools seem to fall in the 40 - 60 K range. Slive getting TAMU, and Delany getting Nebraska means the only SEC type stadiums left are Texas and Oklahoma.

The ACC is really the Big 3 (FSU, Clemson, Virginia Tech) and everybody else. Virginia Tech is smaller than the other 2 but operates at capacity in a conference not know for traveling football fans. The rest of the ACC schools fall in the 20 - 60 K range. The shocker was seeing Miami in the 40K range, well behind UVA, UNC, NCST, MD, and GT in the 50 - 60K range.

In response to this site not liking links, here is some data from the NCAA, numbers are rounded to nearest 1,000 seating average

2007 top 25 in attendance - non SEC schools
#10 Texas 85K, #11 OU 85K, #14 TAMU 82K, #16 Clemson 81K, #17 ND 81K, #18 FSU 74K, #25 Va Tech 66K
2007 top 25 in attendance - SEC schools
Tennessee, Georgia, LSU, Alabama, Florida, Auburn, South Carolina, Kentucky - 8 of 12 schools

2008 top 25 in attendance - non SEC schools
#5 Texas 98K, #12 OU 85K, #14 TAMU 77K, #17 Clemson 76K, #20 FSU 74K, #23 Va Tech 66K
2008 top 25 in attendance - SEC schools
Tennessee, Georgia, LSU, Alabama, Florida, Auburn, South Carolina, Kentucky, Arkansas - 9 of 12 schools

2009 top 25 in attendance - non SEC schools (DKR went to 100K seating at Texas)
#4 Texas 101K, #12 OU 85K, #14 ND 81K, #16 TAMU 77K, #17 Clemson 76K, #20 FSU 74K, #23 Va Tech 66K
2009 top 25 in attendance - SEC schools
Tennessee, Georgia, LSU, Alabama, Florida, Auburn, South Carolina, Kentucky, Arkansas - 9 of 12 schools

2010 top 25 in attendance - non SEC schools
#5 Texas 101K, #12 OU 85K, #13 TAMU 82K, #14 ND 81K, #17 Clemson 77K, #20 FSU 71K, #24 Va Tech 66K
2010 top 25 in attendance - SEC schools (Alabama went to 101K seating)
Alabama, Tennessee, Georgia, LSU, Florida, Auburn, South Carolina, Arkansas, Kentucky - 9 of 12 schools

K mills

You might make a note that Texas attendance in 2007 was 85K because that was the capacity of the stadium in 2007. The stadium was enclarged and the attendance is the capacity of the stadium every year. The only way to get a season ticket at Texas is for someone to die that already has one.

Mama Nudos

Is the next expansion text wall... sorry "article" going to be about hot dog and popcorn prices?

Seriously, none of this is news. You didn't "break" Pitt and 'Cuse and you took forever and a day on Texas A&M with many false starts. Face it, you (John) know absolutely nothing and are just spinning public domain data into "articles" and passing it off to your rabid fan base.

I admit, I fell for it about a year ago during your initial text wall binge and yeah I too concluded Texas A&M was coming.

Missouri? Ooops you whiffed on that. West Virginia? Okay, you were correct that they would be declined, but incorrect because they were never seriously considered in the first place.

Paul, it's Florida State. There you go. A&M didn't come here to share all these new advantages with Missouri. West Virginia would irk too many school Presidents. There will be a 14th (allowing Connecticut to take their place) in due time (1-2 years).

Boom! Done! Stop "covering" this story.

p.s. Everyone BUT Florida State has flat out denied or rejected the overtures.

Jason

Of course FSU has affirmed its commitment to the ACC, and FSU decided not to form an expansion committee. Then there is the matter of whether the "Gentlemans' Agreement" exists or not. FSU might be #14, but that statement is anything but certain... on either side of the issue.

johnmrsec

Mama Nudos...

We don't cover the Big East/ACC so I don't think we're concerned about the Pitt, Syracuse news.

Also, if you search the internet and this site, you'll find that we stated last July that despite the Big 12's salvation, Texas A&M would DEFINITELY join the SEC... a full year before it happened. Last May we broke down a long list of reasons why and we were discussing A&M as a stand-alone candidate before any other site.

If you can find evidence otherwise, I invite you to provide it. Heck, I'll even allow a link.

You can rip us for many things -- most people do -- but being wrong or slow on the A&M news? Uh, that proves you don't read very well. Or that you just have some agenda against me. In which case, enjoy the site. Every click of your mouse makes me money.

As for this by-the-numbers look at things, we stated in Part One that that's exactly what this series is... numbers which really can't be debated (though reading the comments, this easy-to-find public information sure makes people mad). We've spoken to a network executive, a VP with a major sports agency, several sources in BCS schools, and our usual sources inside SEC institutions as well as a couple inside the SEC office. The things we're listing are the things that those people believe play a role in decision-making. They're sources, so they have no reason to lie.

Disagree with their beliefs? Fine. I'm sure an anonymous person calling himself "Mama Nudos" is much more keyed into this process than our sources and MrSEC.com

John

Tierlis

I'm pretty sure the master plan for Kyle Field is to "close the circle" of the stadium. They plan to duplicate the Northwest side of the stadium on the southeast side and close the loop. This would bring the capacity up to 115,000 making it the largest stadium in the nation. They began talks about this back in 2005 but the plan was called off. This jump to the SEC may bring back the plan, I know I read somewhere that they will be reevaluating the stadium in 2013. For now though Kyle Field usually out performs its capacity by 4 to 6 thousand.

K mills

IF TAM loses some more games, they'll need to reduce the size of the monstrosity they call a football stadium....it already holds too many, radical red neck maniacs.

Rob

As soon as A&M does that, Tennessee and Michigan will immediately begin expanding to retake the lead. They both seem to take pride in having the largest stadiums.

Ernest the Cat

I hate the "Kentucky is a basketball school" cliche. Commonwealth Stadium is usually sold out; even a bad game gets 60,000 which is more that most of the teams on this list. Kentucky is such a football school that the fans still hang on to the Bear's teams of the 1950s!

And Mama Nudos appears to be a little too-cool-for-school. Probably a Big East fan.

johnmrsec

Ernest the Cat...

And that's why we pointed out UK has a stadium larger than a lot of football schools.

Thanks for reading,
John

John

UK definitely has good football fans, and they do get good crowds relative to how bad the team usually is. But UK fans care MUCH more about basketball, and that's why it's a "basketball school".

UofA72

Based on his rant about wanting to know more about the coaching hot seats, I think he is either Ole Miss or Georgia. Either way, that would only be one school out of 12/13. That doesn't impact the rest of us near as much as expansion.

Maybe he should start his own blog. He could call it "selfcenteredjerk SEC.com". Still haven't got my answer from above yet, but another choice might be "mynudemotherSEC.com". One last shot- based on his maturity level,"toddlerSEC.com".

Chris

According to Clemson media guide and programs the stadium size is 81,500. For years it was 81,473 and then for a couple of years after the west endzone was completed the size actually went down to 80,300, but for the last two years the official capacity is 81,500. Some preseason mags are up to date and some are not. The school does, however, list it at 81,500
Go tigers! last meeting with SEC expansion candidates:
Clemson 25 Texas AM 24 in 2005
Clemson 62 Missouri 9 in 2000
Clemson 35 FSU 30 in 2011
Clemson 23 Virginia Tech 3 in 2011
Clemson 27 West Virginia 7 in 1989

Like Dabo says, "It's a great day to be a Clemson Tiger!"

Fayettechill14

I like Clemson a lot, but I feel like the big issue with bringing it Clemson is that it makes South Carolina have to fight for its small state with an in-state rival, while massive Florida has its huge state all to itself. Florida already has a massive recruiting advantage (as does Georgia), so why hurt South Carolina, whose forced to raid Florida for a ton of prospects as it is?

Mama Nudos

Thanks for clearing up that life-altering information.

UofA72

Mama Nudos

Still want to know. Does that mean Nude Mother? My Spanish is not that good.

If it does, let me know so I can poke my eyes out.

Whether she has clothes on or not, you sure are making her proud!

AllTideUp

I looked it up. It seems "nudo" is roughly a Spanish translation for the word "knot." It has various derivations though. "Mama" technically isn't a Spanish word so either the guy thinks the phrase "mama nudos" sounds cool or it may be some porn reference.

HoustonVol

Mama -if you don't like the articles, then do not read them. I find this information interesting. Eventually one or more of these schools will be in the SEC.

Mama Nudos

*Yawn*

Seriously, these expansion write-ups were old a few weeks ago. They are just giant text walls of public domain data that nobody wants to read.

Missouri isn't coming. Unless you have dirt on Florida State (and why would you? you're just a blog) then there is no point in all these "I'm pretending to crack the DaVinci Code" expansion posts.

Go back to covering the games and coaching hot seats.

AllTideUp

If you don't want to read them then why do you continue to read them and comment on them? You're probably just a troll trying to get attention and so I shouldn't even bother replying to you, but on the off chance that you actually have something to say here I thought I'd see if you respond.

Tierlis

Yah....I'm pretty sure the "Hot Topics" every week for the pass 4-5 weeks have been about expansion. You are definitely in the minority here.

UofA72

"that nobody wants to read". Speak for your self important self. The number of responses under these expansion articles proves you wrong.

Throw your temper tantrums somewhere else. There's people trying to enjoy sports here.

UofA72

When Arkansas joined the SEC, the Fayetteville stadium held somewhere around 51,000. Part of the necessity for expansion was due to the increase in "visitor" seats required by the SEC. Compared to the old SWC visitor seats sold, it was several thousand more. I don't know the exact number, but some of the old SWC schools would perennially bring only a few hundred. Texas and A&M were the exception, but still didn't equate to the SEC fans.

According to the 2011 Arkansas Media Guide the record attendence was 2010 Alabama game at 76,808.

Because of the SEC fans following their team to away games, any school coming in and already at capacity may find the need to expand.

K mills

SEC, blah, blah, blah, blah....SEC, blah, blah, blah, blah Getting more than a little bit boring and tired. We all know that the SEC is a football factory, not serious academic schools for the most part.

John

So why are you on an SEC site? You realize this site is about SEC football and men's basketball, right? Not scholar's bowl.

Fayettechill14

Arkansas left the south end zone of Razorback Stadium open during the 2000-2001 expansion so it could expand again to around 81,000 if the team ever got better...I imagine having Petrino for a few more years may call for it.

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