The Reporter

Men's basketball ' beats ETSU in the second half Sports, page 5 Vol. CXXI Issue 12 THE EPORTER Stetson University I DeLand, Fla. STAFF REPORT Football brings almost 32K fans to DeLand and revenue for the city HH Close to 32,000 fans attended games for Stetson's first football season since 1957, bringing in lots of publicity for the university as well as economic impact for DeLand and West Volusia County. According (o Assistant Athletic Director for External Operations Jeffery Higgins. total attendance at home football games last season reached 31,987 fans. Tickets for four of the six home games sold out and all student lickets sold out, even after Athletics doubled the original allotment in August. The homecoming game versus Davidson College had the most spectators at 6,544, but the season opener versus Warner University was not far behind with 6,400 spectators. Higgins would not release revenue figures earned last season to The Reporter. "We were pleased with the results and feel that the attendance and revenue figures reflect strong support for the program," he said. Steve Burley, DeLand's economic development manager, said in an email that the city did not collect exact numbers on how much economic impact the games had. However, he said the overall opinion Df other city representatives was hat the games definitely helped the economy in DeLand. "Unfortunately all I could get vcre opinions, all of which were hat football has had a definite posi- ive impact on the local economy," iurley said. The games also had an impact n the Volusia County tourist devel- pment tax, or "bed tax," a 6 percent ix levied on campground stays, otel rooms and rental property, he tax must then be used by the junty to bring in other events that ill attract tourists and create more ;onomic impact. As previously reported by the aytona Beach News-Journal, the :d tax revenue for Volusia in No- :mber, 2013 was 19 percent higher an the previous November. Just c revenue for Volusia's western ea— which includes DeLand— was full 23 percent higher in Novem- r, 2013 than in 2012. A representative of the West ilusia Tourism Advertising Author- ■ told the News-Journal that this /enue jump was mostly because of the two Stetson football home games that month. According to the Vice President of Marketing Greg Carroll, the university has not done a formal study of the economic impact from the games, but plans to do so in the coming months, "Understand that besides being an economic driver, football had other objectives such as enrollment growth, enrollment diversity by geography etc.," Carroll said in an email. Head football Coach Roger Hughes also said that the impact of football goes much farther than just scores or game attendance. "There's a very positive effect that successful programs can have on a university," he said. Hughes coached at Princeton and Dartmouth for years before moving to Florida to coach at Stetson. He said that football is not only more celebrated in the South, but also that Ivy League schools are not as interested in the indirect impact that football programs can have on a university. "Stetson is willing to embrace that, and Dr. Libby is using football for all the good it can have," he said. "That type of exposure, especially in the league we play in, which is a national league, we're marketing Stetson nationwide." Hughes went on to say that games also bring in alumni support and donations, as well as publicity for athletics and the university as a whole. The amount of web traffic and publicity tracked by the marketing department is evident of that. In the past, Carroll said Stetson's marketing department did nol track each individual sport's website traffic because there simply was not as much volume as there is now. "We really never tracked athletics before this," he said. Since last spring, though, there have been increasing amounts of web traffic and media coverage of Stetson's athletics program. "As professionals, this is really significant," he said of the coverage trends. "We're going back now to retrieve data for this last quarter." For example, between Jan. 1 and Oct. 2 of last year, 37.24 percent of the media coverage about Stetson athletics was about football. Basket- Photo courtesy: Patrice Perkins FOOTBALL SCORES 2013 Season Warner 31-3 (W) FL Tech 13-20 (L) Birmingham Southern San Diego Butler Dayton Marist Campbell Davidson Jacksonville Mercer ball followed with 20.8 percent, and baseball with 18.92 percent. Carroll said most of the media coverage came from news outlets in the southeastern states, but also in Philadelphia, Atlanta, Los Angeles and Washington, D.C. "So it's opened up new areas for us," Carroll said. He noted that the amount of coverage could decline in the coming months, though, because the novelty of having a new team wears off eventually. Despite the fact that the team only won two games, Hughes is confident that the team is on the right path to successful seasons in the future. "From the football side of things, I think it's a good first step," Hughes said. "If you would have asked me when I took the job on June 11 and told me that we're going to win two games—probably the two most important games, the first one and homecoming—and have a chance to win four more in the fourth quarter, I probably would have said 'I'd take that all day.'" 34-49 (L) 0-59 (L) 15-35 (L) 20-49 (L) 0-27 (L) 18-19 (L) 26-13 (W) 24-45 (L) 14-41 (L) Hughes said that the fact that team is still very young and inexperienced sometimes makes it difficult to coach, but that it allows him and the rest of the coaching staff to foster a culture of high expectations for the athletes. "You try to put in a culture and a structure in place that increases their level of awareness and responsibility because, like it or not, it's a privilege to play football," he said. Improvements for next season include more work in the weight room for both the defensive and offensive lines, and consistently making sure that the players know how to handle both success and failure. "I think our ability to become more competitive in the league is right there in front of us and very attainable," Hughes said. Student tickets for the 2014 season will go on sale at the spring football game at Spec Martin Stadium on March 14. What's in this issue Fall 2014 seniors have to find residence off campus News, page 3 Photos from MLK Jr Day of Service Back, page 8 Calendar of Music School events (cultural credit opportunities) Back, page 8