Regarding the "butts in the seats" number, the attendance everywhere is down. I watch a lot of college hoops and you see the empty seats everywhere, and Covid is to blame. Lot of oldtimers with season tickets aren't going, and a lot of corporate seats aren't being filled. And a lot of people won't go if there's a mask restriction. I've seen plenty of empty seats for Kentucky, which like us has seats in their school color to hide that there's no one there.
I'm not saying attendance isn't bad here, but that should have been acknowledged in the Shatel's column.