Rich

On Monday we received notification that our long held season tickets in the upper deck 'endzone' of Matt Knight Arena would no longer be available for purchase as season tickets. We are being reassigned seats in Section 211, one of the outside sections on the sides of the court. It appears that they are clearing out both ends and pushing all those season tickets holders into seats located on the sides. I have not seen any reporting on these changes and was wondering if others in the FishDuck community were impacted or at least were aware that this was going? Here is the text of the email: "We are in the process of launching our 2023-24 Oregon Men's Basketball season ticket renewals tomorrow, and wanted to inform you of a change that is being made to the Upper Reserved 200 level sections, where your season tickets are located. Starting this year, Upper Reserved sections 201, 205-210, 214-216, and 220-221 will no longer be available on a season basis and will only be made available for select single games. This change allows us to provide a better gameday environment to season ticket holders and create an overall better in-game experience for our student-athletes. We have worked to relocate your seats to the nearest and newest Upper Reserved sections in either 202, 204, 211, or 213. These sections were Midcourt Terrace last year but have been repriced to Upper Reserved for the upcoming year. You can CLICK HERE to view the seats we have allocated for you, and CLICK HERE to view a map of Matthew Knight Arena. We know some affected patrons may want to move the seats we have allocated them. Because of this, you will be grouped within our elite tier of patrons during our seat selection process in July. At that time, you will be able to move or upgrade any renewed season ticket locations to any available inventory in Matthew Knight Arena. Should you have any questions, please reach out to us directly at 541-346-8281 or tickets@uoregon.edu. Thank you for your support, we look forward to seeing you back in Matthew Knight Arena next season. What do you think about these changes? I was most taken by the statement, "This change allows us to provide a better gameday environment to season ticket holders and create an overall better in-game experience for our student-athletes." Now we had great seats on the aisle in the front row of Sec 208 that has great sight lines down the sideline in front of the students and we can call three pointers going in, as well as, have a bird's eye view into the team huddle with our binocs. We think they are some of the best seats in the house especially for the money. Now we will be in seats on the most distant end of Row C of section 211. These are literally some of the worst reserved seats in the house except perhaps for those sitting behind us or those in the very top of the middle sections. So for us, and perhaps many others who were happy with their seats, we will actually have a much diminished gameday environment. Not actually sure how this will enhance any fan's experience. But what it will do is make the arena look fuller on the sides. I guess this is suppose to improve the in game experience of the players. So was that the real problem with the team this year? Their performance was diminished by looking at the size of the crowd in the stands? Who knew?! I assume this is being done in part to provide the coach with a similar feeling of a full crowd. One is left to wonder did Coach Altman's diatribe blaming the lack of fans in the stands set in motion these abrupt changes? As longtime season ticket holders we feel like we are getting screwed over just so MKA will appear to be more full. It feels like the Athletic Dept just threw up their hands and instead of trying to put more people in the stands they just said let's push them all together and pretend its full. They could have at least just pushed everyone down to the first few rows so the rim looked full. Or maybe put local kids, vets, teachers, whoever in the seats they aren't selling and try to rebuild the fan base with good will and fun times? The increased concession sales would probably be worth it. Or perhaps try doing some actual marketing? If you notice they arbitrarily reassigned our seats rather than allow us to go through a process of seat selection based on our account points which seems unfair. But in their infinite benevolence they are going to push us to the top of the regular seat selection process, but since they filled up all the best spots in the new sections with relocated people what seats will be available to move to? The other option is to pay 60-70% more to get seats in the middle side sections if there are any decent ones available. Furthermore, we will be required to commit to the new seats we don't want before we will even have a chance to see if there are seats that we do want. If we don't find new seats and want to get a refund tough luck. That doesn't seem fair. As a two time UO alum from the 1970s and season ticket holders for Football, MBB and WBB we are pretty dedicated Duck fans. In fact we drive 40 miles in all kinds of weather and on any day of the week to sit in those seats. But not sure it's worth making that drive to sit in the crappy seats we got assigned to. Might as well watch on tv. So good job UO for pushing out your long time supporters. Beyond the personal impact, this seems like a huge step backward for Men's Basketball. Especially, in contrast with the Women's program that has opened the upper level to season tickets in recent years. I can't say definitively why attendance has been declining. The in game experience, the cheesy games, the low level half time entertainment and the dreadful DJ music (just let the band play!) certainly could be greatly improved, but I am not sure that is driving fans away. I expect that there has been a much greater impact from a combination of the pandemic and two years of extremely lackluster play on the court. Once Coach Altman is able to put together a more coachable team and they start playing a better level of basketball the fans would most likely come back. Did the Athletic Dept bail on our beloved Ducks, not believing that they can return to the roaring crowds of previous years? Or are they making the right play?