these issues are larger than just the athletic dept. its a longtime university-wide problem. it's a structural problem (campus design). its a student body problem (disaffection). it's a distraction problem (devices). its a geographical problem (train, city, island). and covid doesnt help.
i recall days where we'd have more ualBAnY fans at our own games than we did. of course, because students will go up there for school and return home. they go to away games. we cant get kids out of their dorm to walk a few hundred yards.
It's been like this forever - I attended in the late 70's, and the apathy/disinterest has been there since then, with small pockets of interest (noted in this thread). Covid definitely reversed momentum, but it's definitely more than that.
If I were in charge, I'd revert to old school, brute force marketing, before each and every game:
1) In addition to SM advertising, I'd put signs up by every dorm on game days;
2) I'd post game day signs throughout campus;
3) I'd get the Athletic interns to "storm the dorm" knocking on doors reminding students of games on game days;
4) I'd have semester tuition giveaways every weekend for student attendees;
5) I'd make sure that all campus newspaper prominently display schedules in every edition;
6) I'd make sure that WUSB frequently advertises schedule;
7) Encourage local vendors to have discounted prices on game days (need to show your ticket);
I'd hire an AD that is a marketer! Fiore, although he did some bad things, was a marketer extreme! Pikiell was a marketer extreme! You need someone that wants to grow demand.
Does the above take work? You bet. Will it fix things in a day, week, month, semester? No way. But it's a start, and you need to cultivate culture. You need to ingrain in students' heads that today is game day and I need to be there to support my team and University. And you need to pound the pavement, day after day after day. Sitting on your ass, firing off FB posts and Twitter Tweets is certainly part of the equation, but it's clearly not enough. Back to old school. It can be done.