Numbers add up to a cold Cassell

By RANDY KING
Exclusive to roanoke.com by 5 p.m. Thursdays

After Wednesday's meeting in Richmond with Virginia, the Virginia Tech men's basketball team -- at least, what's left of it -- will finish the regular season by playing six of its final nine games at home.

Will the friendly February schedule provide a possible cure for the floundering Hokies?

Don't count on it. Cassell Coliseum, you see, is no longer a castle for Tech. At least not for this team.

In the same building where Tech has won 81 percent of its games (369-87) the past 37 seasons, this season's club is 4-4. The four wins haven't exactly come at the expense of murderer's row, either -- William and Mary, UNC Asheville, Coastal Carolina and Winthrop.

Cassell has been the site of a terrible November loss to East Tennessee State and a pair of Atlantic 10 setbacks.

Its poor play at home has put Bobby Hussey's club in the unenviable position of becoming the first Tech men's squad ever to have a losing record in the Cassell.

Tech must win at least three of the six games to avoid establising that ignominious mark. If the Hokies go 3-3, they would finish 7-7 and join the 1988-89 squad as the only Tech teams ever not to have a winning record at Cassell.

Man, how times have changed. Until last season's 8-6 home mark, Tech was 34-6 at Cassell the previous three seasons. All time at Cassell, Tech has posted four perfect records and lost only one game in 11 other seasons.

What's happened? Other than the obvious fact -- the past two Tech teams haven't been very good -- the Cassell no longer provides the Hokies with the sixth-man factor.

Hussey not only doesn't have a bench, he's got no crowd, either.

It appears fan apathy has hit a crescendo. Tech is averaging a paltry 3,765 fans for its first eight home dates in a building where it has averaged 6,888 per game since 1961.

How bad is the number? It's on pace to be the lowest average home turnstile count since Cassell opened in 1961-62.

It's not even close. The previous worst average home attendance was 4,432 in 1992-93, the second season for Hussey's predecessor Bill Foster.

This season's team will be only the fourth in Cassell history to draw less 5,000 per game.

Of course, winning has something to do with it. Just three years ago Tech averaged 8,358 at home in a 23-6 NCAA Tournament-bid season.

With fannies in the seats, Cassell provides one of the biggest home-court edge in college basketball. It's a place where no opposing teams want to tread, must less play.

Not anymore, folks. The Cassell, in its current state, is far from the snakepit it used to be.

Tech has had one decent-sized crowd all season -- 7,182 for rare ACC visitor Wake Forest on Dec. 12.

Besides that, Tech has drawn more than 4,000 just once -- 4,018 for St. Bonaventure on Jan. 16.

The most dissappointing turnout had to be the 3,536 that showed up Jan. 6 for defending Atlantic 10 champion Xavier, one of the few marquee-name teams on the home schedule.

The Hokies' attendance number would be even lower if the official crowd count didn't automatically count some 1,700 season-ticket holders and approximately 750 trade-off tickets to sponsors.

The attendance for both the Coastal Carolina and Winthrop games was listed as 3,194. For the Coastal game, played during an icestorm on Dec. 23, there may have been 500 people in the house.

It must be noted that the schedule hasn't done Tech any home favors. The students, due to holiday breaks, have not been on campus for five of the eight home games.

They will be in town for the Hokies' next Cassell outing, a 2 p.m. Sunday, Jan. 31 affair with La Salle. As fate would have it, that's a terrible date, too. Who's going to show up to see unattractive La Salle on Super Bowl Sunday?

Not many, for sure.

In addition to Tech's losing ways, many of the dwindling Cassell faithful have complained about a lack of identification with Atlantic 10 opponents and the ugly, low-scoring games that the league tends to produce way too frequently. Lack of quality non-league visitors also is a frequent complaint.

The bottom line, however, is still winning and losing. Foster's next-to-last club proved it in 1995-96.

Unlike, say, Dayton, which draws 11,000 a game no matter its record and the opposition, Tech doesn't play in a college basketball hotbed.

Until Tech begins to win with regularity it figures to remain a chilly Cassell.

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