Cowboys save face, but lose 56-48 to the Runnin’ Rebels

This game had everything, massive scoring droughts, incredible individual performances, excellent defense, a comeback, and finally and most importantly – a UNLV win. The MWC Conference Championship quarterfinals saw all four favorites, SDSU, New Mexico, CSU, and UNLV advance to the semis.


In an effort to make this a neutral court, the tournament organizers rented and repainted the same court used during the carrier classic, the outdoor game that featured UNC and Michigan State in San Diego at the beginning of the season. “Neutral Court” or not, opposing coaches and oddsmakers still put the odds on the Rebels to win the championship this year. One thing is certain – nobody is going to make that an easy accomplishment.


Today’s match started extremely slow for both teams. UNLV’s first points were from Chace Stanback, with a signature three. This was supposed to be a good sign, given he has not made any field goals during either of the two previous meetings with Wyoming. The score sat at 5-3 until 11 minutes remained in the half. This was when Mr. Incredible, Mozilla, Mike Moser took the first half over. He was everything and anything, and he singlehandedly outscored Wyoming 18-11. From Moser, we saw an inbounds dunk, a put back throw-in, two three pointers, a nice finger-roll, and at least a jumper or two. Not a whole lot else was happening for the Rebels, but it really didn’t effect the first half outcome. The Rebels took a very comfortable 28-11 lead into the half.


Besides the otherworldly scoring that Mike Moser shared with us, the Rebels played amazing team defense. Wyoming is a much tougher team than their RPI suggests, but they did beat the Rebels previously in Laramie. To me, Wyoming just looked tired to begin the game, but would find new life later. When the Rebels weren’t creating havoc for Larry Shyatt’s team, they were missing open shots. Mr. Defense had to be Justin Hawkins – this guy has the knack for steals the same way Marcus Banks had it – early and often.


The Rebels pushed the lead to as much as 22 points in the second half, and instead of building on that, or maintaining it by trading baskets, the Rebels went cold. Leonard Washington and Luke Martinez brought new life to Wyoming and got the lead as close as 6 points late in the game. The Rebels weathered and persevered by working the defense. Anthony Marshall said it best by saying nothing at all, but pounding the court – a move reminiscent of our sweet sixteen team. Mike Moser, who was mostly silent offensively after the half had a sweet fade away bank shot off glass.


With about two minutes remaining, the Cowboys exploited a consistent weaknesses of the Rebels – foul shooting. Trying to get back in the game (and almost succeeding) Wyoming employed a hack-a-Rebel strategy to put someone on the line and hopefully have them miss – thereby creating a stop and getting the ball back with more time to score. Thankfully, the Rebels were not as horrible as they could have been at the line, but there is certainly room for improvement. The Rebels pushed the lead out to 10 and then it receded a bit and finished at 8.


The immediate question to be asked is how will the Rebels’ legs be against ultra athletic and determined New Mexico come tomorrows game? Coach Rice isn’t concerned, chalking it up to preparation and conditioning. It wasn’t a blowout, but at least it wasn’t as close as the San Diego State win. Be sure to watch tomorrows contest, spoiler alert, you won’t be looking at yellow jerseys any longer.


Reign man: Mike Moser (see above). Honorable mention, Justin Hawkins.

Home sweet home: 74-63 victory over Wyoming

Several storylines:

Rebels look to avenge in game against Wyoming

Graduating  4 seniors cap off impressive run with final home game

Rebels look to stay perfect at home, go for 17 straight home wins

Rebels seek to end season on high note with a win

Another chance for Moser to get back to being Moser

The one that meant the most was that the Runnin’ Rebels had more heart tonight than the Wyoming Cowboys, and gritted out a physical win.

The Rebels had great energy from the start, and outscored the Cowboys by double digits. The impetus for the early lead can be attributed to a nice early jumper by Kendall Wallace, a pair of shots by Mike Moser, and a bunch from Oscar Bellfield, and Justin Hawkins.

The team that most had called a ‘second half’ team for the majority of the season – had become a first half team in recent memory. With the Rebels blazing hot start, the true test of their mettle would be to see if they could weather a few Wyoming runs and maintain the lead – the Rebels prevailed in that aspect.

Only once did the game come dangerously close, and that was about 1 minute to go in the first half when the score was 33-32 Rebels on top. Some how some way the Rebels are a much better team in Las Vegas, and several key players need to be singled out for their accomplishments tonight.

Mike Moser – He was big early, and big late. Not so much in the middle, but nonetheless being big at any time during the game is a dramatic change for Mike given recent history, and getting hot again in a game near the end is a major accomplishment. For Moser’s part, he got back to his double-double ways, scoring 17 points and 12 rebounds. The key to Rebels victories this season can be attributed to Chace Stanback or Mike Moser getting hot. On the rare day they are both firing on all cylinders, we blow out opponents. Mike Moser had a lot of help from his friends, but it was his emotional drive that made this game our own. Some notable plays included a quick drive to the hoop where he was fouled, and not too long after a sweet reverse jam. He was actually perfect from the field (5-5) and 5-7 from the free throw line. Glad to see Mike Moser getting back in the swing of things just in the nick of time.

Kendall Wallace – Welcome back old man, as far as capitalizing on senior night and the start, few players who have struggled so mightily have recovered in such fashion. Kendall was making remarkable shots all night, off balance and contested three pointers as well as big free throws, as he’s the Rebels best option on the line. In the largest point total I can recall from him since he shocked the Lobos two seasons back in New Mexico, Wallace had 14 points and 1 steal in 13 minutes of basketball – phenomenal numbers. Wallace’s confidence in his ability to make big time shots bodes quite well for us moving forward into post-season basketball, hopefully all of the falling down he happened into doesn’t cause his knee to swell too much between now and Thursday. New knickname for Wallace – Substance over Style.

Brice Massamba – The he was literally and figuratively huge for the Rebels tonight. It’s a good night when his layups are rolling, it’s a better night when his freethows are rolling, and it’s the best night of all when he can hit a jumper. Mr. Trifecta arrived tonight, and also capitalized on senior night in grand fashion. Massamba had 15 points, 3 rebounds, 2 steals, and a block. He also played a ton more than he has all season, 31 minutes. Part of  the reason why he had so much playing time was because Coach Rice decided to run Lopez in the power forward spot for a good part of the game. Emotionally, Brice was as important as anyone for the Rebels. The guy was 6 of 8 from the field and 3 of 4 from the free throw line, everyone give it up for Brice – he will be very much missed next year.

Oscar Bellfield – passed New Mexico’s Dariese Gary as the all time conference assists leader tonight. Big numbers from the senior helped as well, his offense came early but he helped in any way he could the rest of the game. 7 points, 9 assists, 2 rebounds, 2 steals, and 2 blocks – he did everything. One of his blocks was a signature ‘oh I know you don’t think you’re going to dunk the ball in transition’ block – the type he’s been pulling off for years. While Oscar had an up and down first half of the season, he has really made it clear that he’s the #1 option for point guard, and likely the best PG in the MWC.

Other players had really good games as well, Anthony Marshall continued his quest to get to the foul line, and crippled Wyoming’s roster in doing so. His 12 points were largely from the freethrow line. Justin Hawkins was 3-6 from the field, and had a really nice steal. I for one would like to see Hawkins getting a lot more minutes – hopefully as a starter next season.

Side notes: Where was Chace Stanback? It was his senior night as well, and he accounted for virtually none of the Rebels production tonight. After 15 minutes of attempted shots and turnovers, he finished with 0 points and remained on the bench for the rest of the game. So much for his senior night being a statement game. Hopefully Chace can be the 3 point threat he’s clearly capable of being, especially at home, and in the tournament. Not to speculate, but I found it highly unusual that when Coach Rice was subbing guys in an out at the end of the game so the seniors could get their ovations, Stanback was not included in the mix – to me it seemed like bad game or not, Stanback at least deserved that kind of  recognition.

Reign Men – Mike Moser, Brice Massamba, Oscar Bellfield, and Kendall Wallace. Fitting that three of the four were seniors. 

Disapointment in Laramie, the Rebels lose 68-66

So a day has passed since the Rebels traveled to Laramie and lost by 2 to the Cowboys. Clearly, anyone here at this point knows what happened in the game, and has either watched it or has read about it, so there is no point in retelling the entire game. Links to recaps of the game, video will follow at the end of this article. 

But having time to reflect on this loss has been valuable, and here’s a perspective a day removed.

This loss will help in the long run: Everyone knows you learn a lot more from your mistakes than victories. While nobody expected a loss at Wyoming to be a bump in the schedule – fortunately its merely a bump in the schedule. Coach Rice will digest this game and find that his team will learn how to better deal with the following things:

1. How to overcome Players that rely on physical strength over talent
2. Teams who make every effort to prevent the Rebels from Runnin’
3. The importance of maintaining defensive intensity
4. The importance of taking the time out
5. Free throw shooting still needs improvement

How to overcome Players that rely on physical strength over talent

The Cowboys are a team chocked full of what appears to be football team rejects, from behemoth Adam Waddell who looks like a linebacker, to even little JayDee Luster who could be a running back and everyone in between – this is an unassuming team. Couple that with their RPI prior to beating the Rebels, and you have a recipe for underestimation. The Rebels did some things right, such as goating the Cowboys into foul trouble by out quicking them. The things the Rebels did wrong was not being careful and committing silly offensive fouls. Foul trouble affected Chace Stanback, who had three fouls in the first half. Foul trouble was not limited to Stanback, Massamba fouled out shortly after Waddell, and Moser and Lopez each had three as well.

A team as good as the Rebels are cannot rely on friendly whistles from the refs, who may have been reacting to the ridiculously sensitive crowd in Laramie, as much as making bad calls. The Rebels need to move without the ball, pass to the open man, and be confident the ball is going in. That’s how we’ve won games all season and will continue to win games.

Teams who make every effort to prevent the Rebels from Runnin’

Credit to Coach Larry Shyatt to neutralizing what the Rebels do well - rebounding, running, and shooting the three. Well, many of the Rebels three point attempts were open shots that didn’t fall, so only collaterally can Coach Shyatt get credit for that. The most obvious thing he did was make the ultimate change by not lining up his players when the Rebels were shooting free throws, instead opting to keep them in the half court to defend against running. I’m still not quite sure how the Cowboys prevented the Rebels from their normal offensive rebounding success, other than having bulky players who rebound pretty well. One factor in the lack of rebounds is that the Rebels overall shot well from 2 point range (22-37) so rebounds aren’t there when you make them. Three point bucket rebounds, where the Rebels shot only 3-14 bounce out unpredictably taking Moser and others out of the equation. Also, if the Cowboys are playing back a bit to prevent the run, they tend to be in better position to rebound a missed three pointer. I’ve never seen a team not line up their players for free throws, so it’s a gimmick that now has been tried and the coaching staff will have to learn to adjust to all three of these things. Obviously, if the Rebels had just made 1 additional three point basket we would have won this one, but sometimes the ball just doesn’t fall in.

The importance of maintaining defensive intensity

There was only one point in this game where I actually saw the Rebels been dominant on defense, and that was in the first part of the second half. The Rebels have been a second half team, but implicit in that is that the Coaching staff at halftime makes the changes necessary to be effective. Be it from travel, exhausting schedule where the Rebels have played more games than anyone in the conference (any probably anyone in the country) or altitude, our signature defensive intensity reared its head only once during this game – and that cannot be the status quo. Runnin’ comes from defense and rebounding, something that Coach Rice frequently mentions, so without those two we have no Runnin’.

The importance of taking the time out

Obviously, down by two points and with the ball with about 30 seconds to go, the Rebels should have taken a time out to make sure a play was drawn up, the right players were on the court, and everyone was on the same page. Everyone knows this didn’t happen. The commentators on the broadcast explained it away by saying that the Rebels were a veteran team and didn’t necessarily need to take a time out in this situation. Bullsh*t. I’ve watched enough NBA games, chocked full of veterans, the best and brightest players, and its rare that they don’t take a time out in this situation. This fault comes down to Coach Rice. Frankly, I’ve been beginning to think he’s superhuman given his success as a first year head coach, but this was an obvious mistake. Now, even if they took the time out there is no guarantee that they would have made the shot. And even if made, in overtime we may have still lost the game – or we could have won, we’ll never know. Either Coach Rice has a standard play drawn up for this situation – which is nearly impossible to do because there is no way to know what team its going to be needed against, or just call the time out.

Free throw shooting still needs improvement

Close games are won and lost at the free throw line. The Rebels were better than they have been from the line, shooting 72% for the game, but it was two unlikely players who underperformed from the line and could have won us the game. Both Reggie Smith and Anthony Marshall were 2-4 from the charity stripe. Now I’m going to stereotype here, but the shorter guys are supposed to have the highest free throw accuracy (has to do with the arc they’re flat footed shooting at). Both should be embarrassed that they were out shot by Quintrell Thomas, who was 5-6.

Final thoughts

It was another loss, not a great loss, but explainable. We shot horribly from three point land, and that’s why we lost. Hopefully much can be learned from this game, and we utterly destroy Wyoming when they set foot in Las Vegas. There were two bright spots in this game, and they deserve to be Reign men even in the loss. Quintrell Thomas and Oscar Bellfield were big for the Rebels, and its important for these two role players to increase their offensive confidence for the Rebels to go deep into the tournament. Thomas scored a season high 15, and Bellfield 12. With a week off the Rebels have a great shot to regain the 1^st place tie once we beat SDSU. GO REBELS!

http://www.unlvrebels.com/sports/m-baskbl/recaps/020412aaa.html
http://www.lvrj.com/sports/unlv-travels-to-snowy-wyoming-138712804.html

Tickets please! A comparative analysis of Rebel basketball ticket prices

UNLV Runnin’ Rebels basketball at the Thomas and Mack Center – often called the greatest show on the strip, and the only one that will never end its run. Being a fan of our beloved Rebels will cost you $0, but game attendance is another matter.

It is important to compare and evaluate what the price of admission to a game at the Thomas and Mack Center is, not necessarily to criticize – but to put things in perspective.

Before talking about dollars and cents, the spectacle and event of going to a Runnin’ Rebels game is something that can’t be quantified by money. The Thomas and Mack area supplanted the UNLV Men’s Basketball team playing at the convention center. The facility opened in 1983, and has since been renovated both inside and out. Before every game the lights are dimmed, a spectacle is created with pyrotechnics, music, and the red carpet. And once the players are introduced, hopefully the Rebels are off to victory in thrilling fashion. Sure, you could watch it on TV, but you would miss the introductory spectacle, the half-time show, and the experience of being there.

The same questions are asked every year of a team people have high hopes for – will UNLV return to the Final Four? Will the three point-streak stay intact? The answer to those questions really rest with the coaches and players. The questions the fans have to answer are “Am I going to renew, upgrade, or downgrade my seats this year”?, or to the non-season ticket holder – how many games am I going to attend, or will I attend games.

A large crowd is part of what makes going to a game at the Thomas and Mack Center fun. Without a large crowd, the cheering is not as loud, the fight song loses some of its meaning, and the energy is decreased. Teams are given home-home-advantages because it's their fanbase and their facilities.  Luckily for the Rebels, attendance numbers have not been the problem. In a city with much more to see and do than anywhere outside of New York or Los Angeles, UNLV regularly does as well as any event in town. While UNLV had previously been an attendance leader not only in the Mountain West, but in the West in general, sadly that title has fallen.

The NCAA has recently released its numbers for the past seasons attendance, and in the top 10 is BYU averaging 18,714 people per home game ranking 6th, sandwiched between Tennessee and Wisconsin. The top attendance school is Kentucky, which averaged 23,603 per home game in 2010-11. Looking at the Mountain West alone, 4 teams cracked the Top-30.

In descending order, here’s how things breakdown:

(1 ;6^th Nat’l;) BYU with 18,714;

(2 ;16^th Nat’l;) New Mexico with 14,570 per game;
(3 ;23^rd Nat’l;) UNLV with 13,253; and
(4 ;30^th Nat’l;) San Diego State with 11,668 per game.

Space limitations certainly hampered San Diego State University’s attendance figures as they pushed the limits of their facilities time and time again this past season (capacity is 12,414). Most impressive among the bunch is New Mexico besting UNLV by more than 1000, given that New Mexico was not seriously in contention for a shot at the big dance, their most meaningful accomplishment was having “newcomer of the year” in Drew Gordon, and beating BYU twice (one time w/o Davies).

Back to the money, here is how UNLV Basketball ticket prices stack up to the competition in the MWC, one prominent team, and an NBA franchise.

Booster funds

Most collegiate programs carry a booster fund, which uses donations from fans to fund scholarships, facilities, and other things. Programs have tied these booster programs to the ability to purchase choice seating at basketball and football games, among other sports.

University athletic budgets take a lot of money to keep the scholarships funded, here is several nice charts provided by Wyoming about the MWC.

While UNLV is middle-of-the-pack when it comes to the ability to raise money, the most interesting statistic in these graphs is that we are DEAD-LAST in number of contributors to the fund. Clearly, there is room for improvement in that department. Perhaps that should be a topic of inquiry in a future article.

What do UNLV Runnin’ Rebels tickets cost?

The UNLV website does an OK job of giving a breakdown of costs, but you have to do some math to get true figures. The more ‘premium’ seats require a donation to the Rebel Athletic Fund, a fund that pays for scholarships for many of the athletes that play college sports at UNLV. Since there’s some addition and then division, I’ll do the math for you after we talk about single game tickets:

Single game tickets:

UNLV has tiered tickets into bad teams, ok teams, and great teams. For example, here is bad and great:

Vs. bad teams,

aka Wyoming

Plaza $103, $87, $35

Dugout $22

Balcony $10

Endzone Balcony $10

Vs. great teams

Wisconsin; BYU

Plaza $103, $87, $38

Dugout $25

Balcony $20

Endzone Balcony $20

Some are not too expensive -- if you can land decent seats. Many/most of those are in the hands of season ticket holders. 

On "Pack the Mack" days (usually 1-2 a season) there is quite a few $10 tickets available. Usually a free shirt promotion as well - good time to go.

Rebel Kids Club

Rebel Kids club is an incentive where for each child a year membership is $30 per year per kid. Members (the children) get free admission to any UNLV sporting event (minus ultra-premium matchups like Wisconsin).  Along with that privilige, comes up to 4 half-price adult admissions. Additional benefits are Rebel Kids Club events, a t-shirt, and a birthday card from Hey Reb! on your child's birthday. I am not familar with the program other than this information, if anyone has used it I'd love to know what kind of seats you got. Other considerations - this sounds like a "yearly" program, and we all know the college basketball season straddles 2 years through the winter months. SO, it is likely the shell-out would be $60 to see a season (but you would still get the following fall, so that's cool).

Student Tickets

Additionally, as is the norm, if you are a student you are eligible for free admission to all home games (not the MWC tournament). You must be a student with an active classes, and you have to go through the website and use your Rebelcard to 'buy' your free tickets. This is a policy change from years past, where all you had to do is show up at the T&M with a Rebelcard and your in. Plus side to student section - good seats, high energy, downside - there won't be a ton of sitting unless its a blowout. 

Season Tickets

-          Includes all exhibition and home games, does not include neutral site games played at The Orleans when the NFR is in town.

-          Quoted prices do not include RAF required contribution in some cases

The only real price there are the $175 and $90 endzone balcony tickets, others mostly require RAF donations. 

Because of the required RAF donation, which granted is a tax deductible charitable donation, here is the real cost of season tickets at UNLV.

Season                                                                                                Per game breakdown

Plaza – Courtside (Gucci Row)$3000+ $485= $3485                        $205

Plaza – Close to court sidelines $1650 +$485 = $2135                      $125

Plaza – Close to court endzones $1025 +$485 = $1510                     $89

Plaza – Mid level mid court $775+$485 = $1260                               $74

Plaza – Mid level corners $525 + 485 = $1010                                  $59

Plaza – High corners  $275 + 485 = $760                                          $43

Dugout selected or $295+$275 = $570                                              $33

Plaza – Endzone above the tunnel $175+$485 = $660                        $39

Dugout – Non-mid-court $100 +$295 = $395                                   $23

Limited no. of plaza non-RAF endzone = $485                                   $28

Balcony Non-endzone = $175                                                            $10

Balcony endzone $90                                                                         $5.29

Additionally, while some of these prices look less daunting when pieced out into single games, many of the RAF seats are unavailable to purchase under single game prices.

UNLV vs. local sporting events

There are sports in Las Vegas, minor league or alternative league sports. The prominent competiton are AA – Las Vegas 51s and Wranglers Hockey (sorry Locos, no time to evaluate your team).

The Las Vegas 51’s 72 home game season ticket package

2011 FULL SEASON TICKETS ARE AVAILABLE IN FOUR PRICE LEVELS

Season Ticket Prices Dugout Seats $936 Field Level $576 Plaza Seating $504 Reserved Seating $432

The math dividing those dollar figures gives you a per-game figure of

Dugout = $13/per game

Field = $8 per game

Plaza = $7 per game

Reserved = $6 per game

Want to buy single games, here are the prices

Dugout = N/A

Field = $14 per game

Plaza = $13 per game

Reserved = $10 per game

They also offer many great mini-plans to entice people who want to see more than a few games, but know an entire season is too big of a commitment. Added bonus -- fireworks shows periodically occur and are worth the price of admission.
Comparison: 51s baseball is cheaper, but less exciting and lets face it -- its minor league baseball.

Las Vegas Wranglers ECHL Hockey

Season Tickets

Glass - $999
Select Circle - $799-  Youth $216
Premium - $599 Youth - $216
Mardi Gras - $499 Youth - $216

Very nice of the Wranglers to give a youth discount, classy. I couldn’t figure out how many home games the Wranglers play but the following is their single game ticket prices:

Single game prices

Glass $38.00
Select Circle $28.50
Premium $21.00
Mardi Gras$17.50
Youth -$10.50

Comparison: Good idea with the youth pricing, really makes this a family outing. Although not the NHL this can be great entertainment for a good price. Still lacks the sense of urgency due to it being somewhat of a minor league. Less expensive than UNLV basketball, if you are a hockey fan go watch!

UNLV vs. Shows

Not a fair comparison, you wouldn’t go see the same show 17 times in a row, unless you might be a rabid Cher, Manalow, or Santana fan. A front row ticket to the best shows are known to run $300-500 a pop. Besides, there’s no winner or losers – what’s the fun in that?

UNLV vs. the MWC

 The data that goes into this chart follows, but essentially this is a breakdown of UNLV vs Several MWC teams in terms of season ticket pricing. The blue line represents all ticket prices added together divided by their number, giving an 'average' ticket price. The red line represents taking out of the equasion the courtside ultra-expensive tickets and then comparing the numbers again.

There is no perfect way to really compare one program's ticket prices vs. another, but without really doing a ton of analytics on each venue, these numbers are interesting for several reasons that I will talk about in the indiviudal team sections.

Let’s take a look at the competition:

Wyoming

Season Packages

Note: Includes 18 home games and all lower level seats require a Cowboy Joe Club donation.

Public Reserved          $176.00

UW Faculty/Staff Reserved (Limit two)        $146.00

Family Plan (4 @ $94)

Sections A1, A2 and E1 only - two adults, two children       $376.00

Courtside        $400.00

Adding the “Cowboy Joe” required contribution here’s the real cost of season ticket membership:

Season (18 home games)                                                                     Per Game

Courtside = $400+$5000 = $5400                                                      $300

Premium (mid-court lowers) = $176 +$750 = $926                             $51

Premium (mid-court higher-low) $176 + $500 = $676                         $37

Scholarship (end-zone mid) $176 +$250 = $426                                 $27

Scholarship (end-zone high) $176 +$125 = $301                                 $17

Cowboy Joe (best 2^nd level) $176+$100 = $276                                 $15

General = $176                                                                                    $10

Single Game Tickets

 Public         Youth (3-18)       Faculty / Staff     Student Guest

All Home Games        $16.00            $8.00                $12.00                $10.00

Additionally, Wyoming has put together mini-plans such as the “Cowboy Weekender” which allows people to purchase all the Saturday home games (8 of them) for a reduced price. That, with the family pack and reduced youth prices – good deals. The only anomaly here is the extremely high price for courtside season tickets. I believe there are two reasons behind this 1) They have less available top-tier seating than most teams, so its supply vs demand; 2) There is a lot of oil and gas money in Wyoming – those guys have to spend it somewhere. Plus, there is literally nothing else to do in Wyoming, except ski in Jackson Hole. Wyoming on the whole (minus the oil price'd ticket) is affordible and makes many accomoditations to families and those not willing to go the distance on a season ticket plan. Most of their tickets are less expensive than UNLV's.

BYU (leaving the MWC)

Season Tickets (* = requires Cougar Club donation)

Prime Lower Chair      $337/$269*

Lower Chair(sec 1-5, 13-17 row 25 & higher)            $269

Prime Upper Chair      $142

Upper Chair    $95

Upper Bench   $75

BYU Faculty/Staff     $149

* = cougar club payment; Bronze = $200

BYU’s website does not specifically say what level of donations equal what seating level, but their plans are similarly tiers to other universities. That said, It appears on the whole BYU tickets are cheaper, and there is the added benefit that because these programs, such as the Cougar Club translate to all sports, you get great seats for a usually great football team.

Subtracting the hard to compare Cougar Club seating, we get the following comparable numbers. Note, some of the seating is long benches rather than stadium chairs.

BYU also offers mini-packages, and assigns priority to buy those packages based upon level of Cougar Club giving as well.

Air Force

Going to an Air Force Falcons game at Clune arena presents on of the best values in the land. Here is the pricing structure:

Season Tickets                                    Single game breakdown

Courtside VIP $600*                          $33
Center Court Club $305*                   $17
Lower Level $180                               $10
Upper Courtside $155                        $9
Lower Baseline $115                          $6
- Family 4 pack $325                         $4.50 per pers
Upper Baseline $100                           $5.50
- Family 4 Pack $245                         $3.40 per person

• Courtside VIP and Center Court Club seats include $75 per season ticket in retail value stored in the barcode on each ticket.  The retail value can be used at all AFAAA concession and retail locations as well as select vendors inside Clune Arena.  The value can be used throughout the men’s basketball season.  Stored value expires at the conclusion of the regular season. 

This is a ridiculously good deal, even if you aren’t a fan of Air Force’s brand of basketball. The Air Force has two booster clubs, the ‘Blue and Silver club’ and ‘Falcon Pride’ but appears seat priority only is applicable to the football games, so you needant donate to get the better seats for basketball.

How is this possible? The Air Force is funded by the federal government. All students have free tuition in exchange for military service after graduation. Therefore, there is no need for boosters to fund scholarships because there isn’t any. Additionally, there is no real need for the Air Force academy to make a profit on their athletics, therefore there is likely very little profit margin, if any, on the tickets. This may be one of the least expensive tickets in all of college basketball - any they usually aren't terrible either. Clearly, less expensive than UNLV.

Colorado State University

Values galore are available to watch the Rams play. However, I could not obtain specific season ticket information.

Here are some examples of single game ticket prices:

New Mexico (Orange Out & Premium game)           

Saturday, Feb. 12        7:00 PM          Adult Reserved - $15 Youth - $8      

UNLV (Premium game)

Saturday, Feb. 19        5:00 PM          Adult Reserved - $15 Youth - $8   
Utah

Wednesday, March 2  7:00 PM          Adult Reserved - $12 Youth - $8      

Rams Club seating gives better seats, dontation level start at $100. Specifically, I found that to get courtside seating, whatever the seats cost + a $2000 donation is required.

CSU offers many other flexible ways to enjoy the Rams games:

Pepsi 4-Packs are back! For the following home games: Drake, Air Force, San Diego Utah receive the following for only $32:

•           4 tickets

•           4 sodas

•           4 hot dogs

Pepsi 4-Packs are available for the NEW! Ram Club Mountain West Plan (only available to Rams Club Members)

•           Receive tickets to four marquee Mountain West Conference home games for $52.

•           Plan includes two premium home games: Jan. 15 vs. TCU, Jan. 22 vs. BYU, Feb. 2 vs. San Diego State and Feb. 12 vs. New Mexico.

Pick 6 Plans

Fans can receive tickets to six games of their choice* for one low price of $60, that's $10 a game!

•           *A limit of two premium games can be chosen as part of the six game selections.

•           Seats are located in the non-premium seating areas (non-Ram Club areas).

Colorado State has an unusual venue for basketball, and their pricing is designed to bring people into the stadium and root for the team. As we all remember, those crowds were particularly loud rooting on their tourney-hopeful team that fell short. Hard to say what the real numbers are without the season ticket data, but I would predict it is less expensive than UNLV.

University of New Mexico

Although New Mexico’s seating plan is much more chaotic than UNLV’s, its worth breaking down because they bested us this year in attendance.

First the single game pricing:

2010-11 Men's Basketball Single Game Ticket Pricing
Adult/Youth   Seats   Single  Single - Premium Games (Arizona State, NMSU, BYU, Utah; UNLV)

            Benches (rows 1-10)  $15 Adult/$10 Youth $17 Adult/$14 Youth

            Benches (rows 11-25)            $20      $24

            Benches (rows 26-33)            $26      $31

            Benches (rows 34-45)            $29      $35

Doing the math

Season tickets                         Per game breakdown

Row 1 - $3075                        $171

Rows 2-4 -$2865                    $159

Chairbacks Sec C-G

Rows 22-32 - $1826               $101

Rows 20-21- $1772                $98

Rows 11-19 - $1522               $85

Row 10 - $1432                      $79

Rows 5-9 $932                        $52

Chairbacks (A-B)

Rows 30-34 $1826                  $101

Rows 26-29 $1576                  $88

Rows 22-25 $1326                  $74

Rows 20-21 $1272                  $71

Rows 11-19 $1022                  $57

Row 10 $932                          $52

Rows 5-9 $682                        $38

Benches (Sec H-Q, U-Z)

Rows 41-45 $1468                  $82

Rows 36-40 $1218                  $68

Rows 34-35 $968                    $54

Rows 26-33 $896                    $50

Rows 21-25 $574                    $32

Rows 16-20 $424                    $24

Rows 11-15 $324                    $18

Rows 1-10 $252                      $14

Benches (Sec R-T)

Rows 34-38 $1468                  $82

Rows 30-33 $1396                  $78

Rows 26-30 $1146                  $64

Rows 21-25 $824                    $46

Rows 16-20 $574                    $32

Rows 11-15 $424                    $24

Row 10 $352                          $20

Rows 1-9 $252                        $14

I told you it is archaic! So many different potential prices for season tickets!

As you can see by the graph, once you subtract the high-dollar courtside tickets, you still have some darn expensive ticket prices - the highest in the MWC. Likely, though that many do not buy season tickets and opt for the per-game option. Normally you would expect to see steep discounts between per game season tickets and piecemeal tickets -- I'm not seeing it here.

Comparison: New Mexico is more expensive, and has more attendance. I have no idea why this is but it is not a good thing for UNLV.

San Diego State University

Season Tickets (only 16 games last year)     Per game breakdown

             

Courtside $3000                                             $188

Low mid-court $916                                       $57

Mid mid-court $615                                        $38

More mid and endzone $465                          $29

Endzone mid $255                                          $16

Enzone and corners mid $205                         $13

Reserved high seating $109                            $7

General admission (high) $99                         $6.18

Single game tickets are represented in this graphic.

SDSU is right on par with UNLV for the overall average price, but is slightly cheaper excluding the front row price. The Aztecs have a lot of competition from other activities in San Diego - Chargers, Padres, and USD. They lack youth pricing as well, and are hampered by a smallish venue.
Comparison: Tied with UNLV

UNLV vs.other big time college basketball teams

Unable to find season ticket data, here is what data I could find on Kansas:

Single games

11/2/10 Washburn $35.00 $20.00 October
25,
2010

11/9/10 Emporia
State $35.00 $20.00 October
25,
2010

11/12/10 Longwood $50.00 $35.00 October
25,
2010

11/15/10 Valparaiso $50.00 $35.00 October
25,
2010

11/19/10 North
Texas $50.00 $35.00 October
25,
2010

11/23/10 Texas
A&M
–
CC $50.00 $35.00 October
25,
2010

12/2/10 UCLA $75.00 $50.00 October
25,
2010

12/11/10 Colorado
State $50.00 $35.00 October
25,
2010

12/18/10 USC $75.00 $50.00 December
6,
2010

12/29/10 Texas‐Arlington $50.00 $35.00 December
6,
2010

1/2/11 Miami
(OH) $50.00 $35.00 December
6,
2010

1/5/11 UMKC $50.00 $35.00 December
6,
2010

1/15/11 Nebraska $75.00 $50.00 December
6,
2010

1/22/11 Texas $90.00 $75.00 December
6,
2010

1/29/11 Kansas
State $90.00 $75.00 December
6,
2010

2/7/11 Missouri $90.00 $75.00 January
24,
2011

2/12/11 Iowa
State $75.00 $50.00 January
24,
2011

2/19/11 Colorado $75.00 $50.00 January
24,
2011

2/21/11 Oklahoma
State $75.00 $50.00 January
24,
2011

3/2/11 Texas
A&M $75.00 $50.00 January
24,
2011

Comparison: Clearly for this perennial 1-seed they have higher ticket prices - NBA style ticket prices in fact. Obviously more expensive than UNLV, and in Kansas, probably worth it.

UNLV vs. the NBA

I've selected one team to compare with, we're not talking the Lakers. We'll go with my beloved bottom dwelling Golden State Warriors. Here are their season tickets:

As you can see, their prices aren't extraordinarily higher than UNLV's.
Comparison: UNLV is going to win a championship before the Warriors will, but you're not going to see Kobe, Lebron, or Durant play against the Rebels, so there's always that.

Final words
The proof is in the pudding, if Rebel basketball weren't worth watching then average attendance of 13,253 would not be that high. People aren't going to the games and walking out saying they've been ripped off - its a fun atmosphere that likens more to an NBA game than a college game in terms of theatrics. 


There is always room for improvement, and having viewed what other teams are doing and charging - there are some glaring examples. 


1) Encourage families to go - UNLV lacks family pack pricing, and youth ticket discounts. Before you say, WAIT - they have the Rebel Kids Club -- it's a mysterious program that works for the overall NCAA athletics but is not specifically tailored to UNLV Basketball. Why not reduced youth prices for season tickets? Where is the "pepsi 4-packs" where people get hot-dog, drink, and ticket for a reasonable price?


2) Lower ticket prices - it will be interesting to see whether Las Vegas's massive unemployment (and underemployment) will hurt ticket buying and attendance next year. There is certainly no reason to raise prices, but there is a good reason to lower them. Probably in the grand scheme Dave Rice's lower salary isn't helping the bottom line much - but there's some money there.


3) Mini-plans - Most of the other teams offer season ticket type plans with flexible offerings. Instead of 18 games, how about 10, 8, 6 or 4? Also, give people who buy mini-plans some reward above and beyond single game purchasers, like a parking benefit. Obviously these tickets would be better seats and lower prices than single game tickets. 


4) Expand the Alumni reach - Try something experimental, push the alumni discount on season tickets out to 10 years instead of the 2 or 3 years it currently is. Additionally, make a starter RAF fund donation something like $25 for this level. This would increase attendance by alumni, and get these people in the habit of donating to the RAF fund. 


5) Better marketing - Billboards seem to be the weapon of choice for UNLV, expand it to web-advertising, twitter advertising, maybe even a groupon type of deal. People who are not die-hards need another reason to come to the games, its pretty easy to stay at home and watch in high def for nothing. 

I hope you've enjoyed this comparison, it took a lot more time than I expected but I believe it shines a little light on a not often considered subject. If you have any ideas or breakdowns of your own, please share.

Sources:

Offical websites of UNLV, Wyoming, CSU, Air Force, BYU, SDSU, New Mexico, Golden State Warriors, Kansas.

http://www.ncaa.org/wps/wcm/connect/public/ncaa/resources/latest+news/2011/april/mens+basketball+attendance+tops+32+million+again

http://www.themwc.com/sports/m-baskbl/spec-rel/042611aae.html