Analysis on UH attendance 2015/2025

Football
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Pulling full attendance for both seasons so the comparison is on the same basis.Home crowds were almost flat. The 2015 team was better and ranked longer, but TDECU did not draw much more than it did in 2025.

Both seasons used the same building. The 2015 official totals count eight home dates (including the American title game) at 271,836, an average of 33,980. The 2025 home average was 32,215 across six games. That is about 1,765 fewer fans per game, roughly 5 percent.

2015 2025
Record 13–1, AAC champs, Peach Bowl 10–3, Texas Bowl
Coach Tom Herman, year 1 Willie Fritz, year 2
Home games 8 6
Home total 271,836 193,291
Home average 33,980 32,215
High 42,159 (Memphis) 42,806 (Texas Tech)
Low 25,204 (SMU) 25,049 (West Virginia)

Drop the 2015 conference title game and the regular-season home average is still 33,731. Same story.

Game by game:

2015 home: Tennessee Tech 30,479; Texas State 35,257; SMU 25,204; Vanderbilt 29,565; Cincinnati 32,889; Memphis 42,159; Navy 40,562; Temple (title game) 35,721.

2025 home: Stephen F. Austin 28,150; Colorado 37,899; Texas Tech 42,806; Arizona 28,535; West Virginia 25,049; TCU 30,852.

The ceiling did not move. Memphis in 2015 and Texas Tech in 2025 are the only true packed houses, and the Tech crowd was heavily visiting fans. The floor did not move either. SMU on a Thursday in 2015 and West Virginia in 2025 both landed right at 25,000.

What did change is the product around the number. In 2015 Houston was undefeated into late November, on ABC twice late, and still only cleared 40,000 twice. In 2025 a 10-win Big 12 team averaged a bit less, and the one sellout was an opponent takeover. Ticket sales also fell hard year over year: $3.76 million in 2025 versus $6.64 million in 2024, a 43 percent drop, even though announced attendance rose about 17 percent from the 2024 average of 27,423. Announced crowd and paid demand are not the same thing.

Away and bowl figures are other schools’ buildings, so they do not measure the UH fan base. For the record, 2015 road games ran 17,146 to 50,019, and the Peach Bowl drew 71,007. In 2025 the road range was 29,338 to 54,256, and the Texas Bowl at NRG drew 63,867.

1 Like
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Funk has already laid it out there for all to see…

Houston is a Big Event city.

Unfortunately, most people don’t see UH vs UCF as a big event. Especially, the day before Texans v Cowboys. The last time I went to the Texans v Cowboys game there was a line 10 deep at the porta potty @ 9am.

UH vs Okie State & v Baylor will be big events.

It is what it is.

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Here we go again. The guy that pretends official attendance is the same as actual attendance. People showed up to a number games in 2015 (Cincinnati, Memphis, Temple, even Texas State). Other than the Tech game last year, attendance was pathetic.

Lessons:

  1. Official attendance does not show up as a full stadium on TV.
  2. Since official attendance measures something other than actual attendance, comparing figures from 2025 to 2015 is not appropriate

[For the record, in my opinion, the 2015 Memphis game was the best environment ever at TDECU – even better than 2016 Louisville]

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We’re in the Big 12 now tho. We’ve run out of excuses at this point.

2 Likes
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Agreed. I’m excited that the wrong was made right and we now are in the BigXII, but at some point the administration will need to ask what has been the return on investment of hundreds of millions of dollars over the past two decades.

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Conference USA here we come!