Mountaineer Football: Holgorsen Complains of Poor Fan Showing at Bowling Green

Toward the end of Dana Holgorsen's press conference on Tuesday the coach rightfully voiced his displeasure concerning the poor attendance of Mountaineer fans at Milan Puskar Stadium during the Bowling Green game on Saturday.

The official records show that the attendance for the game was only 46,603 a week after we packed the stands at over 62,000 against No. 2 ranked LSU.

I am also more than positive that more fans left the stands throughout the game due to the poor weather that day. The temperature was in the 40 degree range, it was raining and WVU was blowing out its opponent to an eventual 55-10 final score.

So the big question is why there was such a huge contrast from the LSU game and the Bowling Green game? I would have to say the top two reasons are we lost the LSU game and the rain.

If we would have defeated LSU there would be even more buzz around Morgantown. I am sure the stands would have had at least 5,000-10,000 more fans in them.

Rain always has an affect on sporting events. If the weather is perfect you will always have more fans at an event. If you have cold mixed with rain then you have to expect that attendance will be lower than it would be otherwise.

Are WVU fans less passionate because of the low attendance last Saturday? Of course not, but Holgorsen is absolutely justified in his remarks during his press conference.

We as Mountaineer fans should not care about the weather. Have a few extra drinks to keep you dry (or make you not care), walk your happy "back side" to the stadium, be loud and enjoy the game.

I conducted a brief study on Holgorsen's home game attendance from the last five seasons at Texas Tech, Houston and Oklahoma State that, if nothing else, should be interesting to look at.

Just remember that he was only an offensive coordinator at these schools so in my opinion he is holding West Virginia to a higher standard since this is his first head coaching position.

2006 Texas Tech Red Raiders

Stadium: Jones SBC Stadium

Capacity: 52,882 (In 2006)

Number of home games: six

Average attendance: 50,873

Highest attendance: 56,158 against No. 5 Texas

Lowest attendance: 45,457 against Oklahoma State

2007 Texas Tech RedRaiders

Stadium: Jones AT&T Stadium

Capacity: 52,882 (In 2007)

Number of home games: six

Average attendance: 52,882

Highest attendance: 55,491 against Texas A&M

Lowest attendance: 46,558 against Iowa State

2008 Houston Cougars

Stadium: Robertson Stadium

Capacity: 32,000   

Number of home games: six

Average attendance: 21,518

Highest attendance: 26,555 against Southern University

Lowest attendance: 18,134 against UTEP

2009 Houston Cougars

Stadium: Robertson Stadium

Stadium Capacity: 32,000

Number of home games: six

Average attendance: 25,241

Highest attendance: 32,114 against Texas Tech

Lowest attendance: 20,125 against Southern Mississippi

2010 Oklahoma State Cowboys

Stadium: Boone Pickens Stadium

Capacity: 60,218

Number of home games: seven

Average attendance: 51,171

Highest attendance: 55,935 against No. 13 Nebraska

Lowest attendance: 48,248 against No. 24 Texas A&M

2011 West Virginia Mountaineers (Through 4 Home Games)

Stadium: Milan Puskar Stadium

Capacity: 60,000

Number of home games so far: four

Average attendance: 55,332

Highest attendance: 62,056 against No. 2 LSU

Lowest attendance: 46,603 against Bowling Green

Highest Attendance of Holgorsen Coached Game Home or Away

Holgorsen coached Oklahoma State to a 33-16 win at Texas that had an attendance of 100,659 fans. This marks the highest attended game that Holgorsen has coached in.

Even though Texas was not ranked it must have been something to watch those Longhorn fans empty out in disgust.

Closing Remarks

We can see that there have not been too many home games in Holgorsen's career as an offensive coordinator that really overshadow what West Virginia is doing right now as far as attendance is concerned.

However, it is easy to notice a drop from 62,000 to 46,000. We need to be critical about how we showed up at the Bowling Green game.

Coach is challenging us as fans to show up and support our team more so than we already are. Fight the rain, cold and eventual snow and support your Mountaineers.