Either way, the number of fans at high school football games dwarfs the numbers attending professional football games.Įarly season crowds have been strong in many areas of the country with terrific fall weather – current and former students parents, grandparents and friends of players on the team longtime fans and supporters in the community. An unofficial attendance survey conducted by the NFHS in 2011 indicated about 165 million fans attended high school football games during that season, which included up to five weeks of playoffs and a weekly average of 11 million fans. With approximately 7,123 games every Friday night (14,247 divided by 2), and with a conservative estimate of 1,000 fans per game, there are more than 7 million fans in high school football stadiums every week. While impressive, it doesn’t come close to the number of fans who watched high school football during the corresponding week. In Week 2 of the National Football League season, just under 1.1 million fans attended the 16 games. 1 fan base in America? The answer is that number again – 14,247. Although there are many options today for the entertainment dollar, nothing surpasses supporting the local high school football team on Friday nights. These numbers express the desire by high schools to keep alive one of the oldest and most treasured traditions in our nation – Friday Night Football Under the Lights. The survey indicates an additional 156 schools and 1,594 participants involved in these alternate forms of the sport and, in the past 10 years, participation by girls in 11-player football has doubled, with more than 2,400 participants this past year.
In addition, smaller schools in some states have shifted to 6-player, 8-player and 9-player football and have had good responses. In fact, the number of schools last year with 11-player teams has only been topped twice in the survey’s history – 14,262 in 2013-14 and 14,279 in 2010-11.
While there was a slight decline in the number of participants in many states, the number of schools sponsoring the sport was the highest in five years. Yes, 14,247, the number of high schools with 11-player football teams. However, perhaps the most important number was overlooked – 14,247. After all, the report showed 30,829 fewer participants than the year before. When the annual High School Athletics Participation Survey was released by the National Federation of State High School Associations (NFHS) in August, many headlines across the country focused on the drop in the number of boys playing 11-player football.
0 kommentar(er)
