What happened to our home court advantage?

[jdpapa3]

I had season tickets last year and was able to go to a fair amount of games in the championship season. The hunger of the fans and the fan demographic is simply not the same. Every game felt huge during the 07-08 season and now it's more of a ho-hum attitude and you can't really sense the buzz in the arena.

I disagree with the notion that it is the team's play that is the result of a more tame crowd. Big plays don't get the same "pop" as 2 years ago.

I would also refer people to my uncle, who I feel is a good benchmark. He has had season tix for the past 3 seasons, went to every game in the title run, and about 80% of them last year. This year he only really cares about the Lakers, Cavs, Magic and the playoffs. Any other game and he'll try to give the tickets away to friends and family and they are not generally huge basketball/nba fans and do it for the night out. I feel we are seeing an arena filled with a lot of this now.

Good news is that it will all change in the playoffs and the Garden will get rowdy again. The level right below the diehards(my uncle) aren't giving those games up.

[Drucci]

I've never been in the Garden, of course, but from what I hear while watching the broadcast, it seems, indeed, that the Garden is not as loud as before and not as "rocky". It seems to me that the crowd only gets really excited on certain plays, like the Rondo fastbreaks or a couple of straight buckets while it got on his feet really easily before and helped the team step up its level of play.

I don't think you can blame the crowd for the team's poor performance at home, though. The boos, on the contrary, did help the team to step up and stop disappointing its fans.

Like jdpapa, I'm confident it will be another story in the playoffs. I've re-watched some late situations from last year's playoffs recently and man, the Garden was such electric and such loud that it was very impressive. Every bucket down the stretch made the crowd litterally explode, awesome! Can't wait to see this kind of support back in the Garden...

[Greenbean]

TP Liam for posting what I havent gotten around to. You are right on and I also started thinking about it watching the Utah crowd affect the game in so many ways.

I am not sure what the reason is but it probably has something to do with the lack of "real" fans at the game similar to LA. In Utah, I am pretty sure it is not a status thing to attend a basketball game. It is also probably affordable. Boston is one of the biggest college towns in the world and yet a normal college kid can probably only afford to go to one game a year. Do you know how loud college kids can get at sporting events?

Anyway at some point we have to give our team a home court advantage at games. I know it is a chocken or the egg argument, but as Hubie put it in the Spurs game, "It seems like this crowd needs a reason to get loud". When something spectacular isnt happening, it is silent in the building.

Unfortunately, jumbotron generated noise is the only noise going on at these games. So...why not make the jumbotron generated noise more frequent? Whoever is working that thing has a lot of power in their hands and it about time that guy or girl starts working these people!


Put it this way, I have NEVER seen a crowd ignore a noise meter. Keep that thinkg there for the whole game!

[Mike-Dub]

I 1st noticed this during the Utah game ( The fans in Utah are rabid and never stop either booing bad calls or cheering there team on to victory!) but our fans are not bringing it. Are we spoiled because we've seen so much great basketball in Boston? Are we just lazy, like LA fans and only cheer the spectacular over the solid play? After that Jazz game I went to the garden for the Spurs game and there was no energy in the building from start to finish. Is that why our team is so good away from home, better crowds?

TP for starting this thread also Liam, I've been thinking about this for a while.

[Mike-Dub]

TP Liam for posting what I havent gotten around to. You are right on and I also started thinking about it watching the Utah crowd affect the game in so many ways.

I am not sure what the reason is but it probably has something to do with the lack of "real" fans at the game similar to LA. In Utah, I am pretty sure it is not a status thing to attend a basketball game. It is also probably affordable. Boston is one of the biggest college towns in the world and yet a normal college kid can probably only afford to go to one game a year. Do you know how loud college kids can get at sporting events?

Anyway at some point we have to give our team a home court advantage at games. I know it is a chocken or the egg argument, but as Hubie put it in the Spurs game, "It seems like this crowd needs a reason to get loud". When something spectacular isnt happening, it is silent in the building.

Unfortunately, jumbotron generated noise is the only noise going on at these games. So...why not make the jumbotron generated noise more frequent? Whoever is working that thing has a lot of power in their hands and it about time that guy or girl starts working these people!


Put it this way, I have NEVER seen a crowd ignore a noise meter. Keep that thinkg there for the whole game!

You've never been to a URI basketball game then, the fans for my rams (the few  that show up even when the team has had a great season like this one) are quieter and worse than the c's fans at the games (who have been terrible this year). 

URI fans don't even notice that the noise meter is going on during the game it's sad.

[Mike-Dub]

Sorry just posted something in the wrong thread.

[Greenbean]

TP Liam for posting what I havent gotten around to. You are right on and I also started thinking about it watching the Utah crowd affect the game in so many ways.

I am not sure what the reason is but it probably has something to do with the lack of "real" fans at the game similar to LA. In Utah, I am pretty sure it is not a status thing to attend a basketball game. It is also probably affordable. Boston is one of the biggest college towns in the world and yet a normal college kid can probably only afford to go to one game a year. Do you know how loud college kids can get at sporting events?

Anyway at some point we have to give our team a home court advantage at games. I know it is a chocken or the egg argument, but as Hubie put it in the Spurs game, "It seems like this crowd needs a reason to get loud". When something spectacular isnt happening, it is silent in the building.

Unfortunately, jumbotron generated noise is the only noise going on at these games. So...why not make the jumbotron generated noise more frequent? Whoever is working that thing has a lot of power in their hands and it about time that guy or girl starts working these people!


Put it this way, I have NEVER seen a crowd ignore a noise meter. Keep that thinkg there for the whole game!

You've never been to a URI basketball game then, the fans for my rams (the few  that show up even when the team has had a great season like this one) are quieter and worse than the c's fans at the games (who have been terrible this year). 

URI fans don't even notice that the noise meter is going on during the game it's sad.

I am from RI and I have been to plenty of URI games and sadly, you are right. People dont get excited about URi basketball just like no one was really excited about my NU Huskies even when we had JJ Barea and were pretty competitive in the America East conference.

I think you know what I mean though. Get a bunch of (drunk) college kids together cheering for an exciting team like the Celtics and it turns into a madhouse.

[Chris]

As a season ticket holder, I can say pretty confidently that the Garden crowd has been different this year.  A lot of the die-hard season ticket holders have rarely been at the games, and instead the tickets have been sold to families, and more often, college kids who are there to drink and make fools of themselves, rather than watch basketball.

I think this will change in the playoffs (as it has changed in a few of the marquee games this season), but for the rest of the regular season, I think we are going to be watching the wave go around the arena with 3 minutes left in the 4th quarter, rather than feeling real energy in there.

Of course, this is separate from the fact that the team has seemed to take home games for granted, and has not had any focus for them...but the crowd is most certainly different.

[Cman]

I 1st noticed this during the Utah game ( The fans in Utah are rabid and never stop either booing bad calls or cheering there team on to victory!) but our fans are not bringing it. Are we spoiled because we've seen so much great basketball in Boston? Are we just lazy, like LA fans and only cheer the spectacular over the solid play? After that Jazz game I went to the garden for the Spurs game and there was no energy in the building from start to finish. Is that why our team is so good away from home, better crowds?

In a perfect world, it would be great if the crowd was into it.  The Utah comparison reminds me of when I lived in Portland Oregon.  The Blazers almost always had the crowd with them, sort of like the Jazz.  I think this is partly to do with the fact that both cities have only one pro sports team. 

My take is that Boston fans have been spoiled by (a) great pro-sports teams and (b) great-good Celtics play in the last couple years. 

On (a), I think many casual Boston sports fans are in for a rude awakening at some piont in the next decade.  We've been spoiled, and these things tend to go in cycles.  Wouldn't surprise me if you told me that 10 years from now, none of the Boston area pro sports teams made the playoffs.