The University of Memphis men’s basketball team drew record-breaking crowds to the Pyramid for the second consecutive year.
The Tigers ranked 10th in the nation in paid attendance, with 340,723 tickets sold for 21 home games during the 2001-02 season. On average, Tiger fans bought 16,225 tickets per game last season.
And while the average paid attendance dropped from 17,110 per game two seasons ago, last season marked the first time ever the Tigers have topped the 300,000 mark in total attendance.
“I think there’s room for even higher numbers in the future,” basketball media relations director Ron Mears said. “It just depends on the kind of start the program gets and how we do in the early weeks of the season.”
The Pyramid also saw Memphis play before two sell-out crowds last season of 20,004 each. The two regular-season sellouts came against regional rival Arkansas and conference rival Louisville.
Memphis has now set a new total attendance record in each of head coach John Calipari’s first two seasons.
Said Mears: “I think that Coach Calipari has generated a lot of excitement here at The University for the basketball program, and that excitement has been shown in the type of numbers that we were attracting to our games.”
—Daniel Ford
