With fan attendance to UNLV men’s basketball declining for multiple years amid on-court struggles, the university’s athletic director said the easiest way to fill the stands again is to win games.

Erick Harper, director of athletics for UNLV, said success on the court will lead to fans again filling the Thomas & Mack Center at a greater rate.

Looking at the football side, fans started showing up more once the team started winning. Moving into the $2 billion Allegiant Stadium in 2020 also helped draw fans, who wanted to check out the brand-new building.

That said, Harper doesn’t see the over 40-year-old Thomas & Mack as a hindrance to fan turnout. UNLV men’s games have averaged 5,173 fans per game this season.

“If you’re competing at a high level and you’re winning consistently, case in point, University of Kansas, they’re in a much older building than we are here, but they’ve won a ton of games to include national championships over and over again,” Harper said. “But their place fills up regardless of what time the game is. But, that’s based on really how they play and as much as they win. So that, I wouldn’t say that the age of an arena is an issue at all whatsoever. This is still an iconic arena that has a lot of activity, over a million visitors a year to the building. So I think it’s still a place to have a great atmosphere, regardless of the fact that the age of the building. I think it’s still a great opportunity and a great facility. “

With UNLV and the majority of Mountain West teams being located on the West Coast, late game starts are a common thing. That comes with the territory, Harper said. With games often starting at 8 p.m. or later and a myriad of things to do in Las Vegas, fans have opted to go elsewhere as the team struggles each season.

“But I’ve seen teams that have won consistently that are on the West Coast and whether they tip off at 8 o’clock or 9 o’clock, they’ve got a large crowd,” Harper said. “Obviously, in this city, there’s a lot of things to do in this city. which is fantastic, which is why it’s a great city. There’s so many different things to do. But when you when you match up against 8 o’clock or a 9 o’clock game and you’re not winning consistently, it’s easy to say I’m not going to go to the game.”

Seating changes

UNLV this week announced plan changes to the seating arraignment at the Thomas & Mack, moving the band back to the student section, swapping the home and away benches and moving the Courtside Club where the band is located this season.

Those changes were done with giving a better home-court advantage in mind, Harper said. The band was moved from the student section to near the away bench ahead of the 2019-20 season, before Harper was the athletic director. He wanted to return the student and band setup back to a more traditional one seen at other schools.

“We thought it would be, it was time to go back to that, but at the same time, flip the benches so that the visiting team was still shooting into the student section as well as into the band,” Harper said. “And our band has grown quite a bit in the last couple of years, which is outstanding. But we wanted to have that experience for them.”

Swapping the benches also allows UNLV to get to the tunnel leading to their locker room before, during and after a game without the players from each team have to cross each other when the opposing team heads to their tunnel, Harper said.

Student turnout

Going back to winning, the student section especially, has been light in recent years, with UNLV doing everything from giving away tuition and custom Nikes, to offering $4 beer nights. Despite the efforts, student attendance has remained down. Winning will change that, Harper said. The issue is a lot of the student body live off campus and also hold jobs at night.

“We’ve done a lot of different things; winning helps,” Harper said. “That kind of starts the catalyst and then when somebody goes and has a great experience, they’re more apt to come back than if they go and they have a so-so experience. Then it becomes, maybe I’ll go to the game, maybe I won’t. But if you can get them in a building with various different ways, winning cures a lot. It doesn’t cure all, but it cures a lot when it comes to attendance.”

End season strong

With this season’s squad dealing with injuries the entire stretch, Harper believes if the Rebels can close out the season on a high note and string some wins together to close out the regular season heading into the conference tournament that the carryover effect into next season could come into play.

“I mean, when you can finish the season strong, you definitely build on that momentum to go through the summer and through the remaining part of spring and through the summer and the fall and with our fall sports kicking off, when things are exciting, It builds excitement, it breeds excitement, and it’s a domino effect from an excitement perspective,” Harper said. “And I’ve been in places where you have a good football, volleyball season, it just catapults into basketball season and you have success in basketball. It’s infectious.”

Contact Mick Akers at makers@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-2920. Follow @mickakers on X.