Men’s volleyball is arguably BYU’s third most popular sport.
That is, if you compare the attendance numbers between each of BYU’s sports, men’s volleyball ranks third behind football and men’s basketball.
The Smith Fieldhouse is the home of the No. 2 Cougars who went 10-0 at home during the regular season. An average of 2,734 people watched the Cougars compete at every home game this season.
The season high for attendance at a men’s volleyball game this season was 4,101, when the Cougars faced off against UCLA on Feb. 5. The lowest turnout at a home match this season was 1,499, when BYU defeated Hawaii on Mar. 24.
BYU men’s volleyball interim head coach Rob Neilson said the crowd is always a key factor in BYU’s home games.
“This crowd’s awesome,” Neilson said after BYU’s win over Hawaii on Mar. 25. “They’re our seventh man out there.”
The season high attendance numbers for every other sporting event, other than football and men’s basketball, lie under the men’s volleyball’s season low. Women’s basketball attendance came the closest, recording a season high attendance of 1,450 when it defeated San Diego State on Feb. 26.
The Cougars set the NCAA single-match attendance record in Feb. 19, 1999, when they defeated Hawaii in front of 14,156 spectators in the Marriott Center — a record BYU still holds. BYU went on to win its first NCAA national title that year.
So what draws so many spectators to watch the BYU men play volleyball?
Chad Groscost and Whitney Groscost are BYU fans who have attended about half the matches in the Smith Fieldhouse this season. They both enjoy the atmosphere inside the Fieldhouse during volleyball games.
“Every single game is super exciting,” said Chad Groscost, 24, an exercise science student from Mesa, Ariz. “I don’t think that I could pick one in particular that I like more than the others.”
Whitney Groscost, 23, a senior studying communication disorders from Tucson, Ariz., said she likes attending men’s volleyball games in the Smith Fieldhouse because of the high energy level.
“I love when our team is dominating and everyone is on their feet,” she said. “The energy level is through the roof.”
Chad Groscost described the environment in the Smith Fieldhouse in one word.
“In one word, it’s electric,” he said. “All the fans get so into the game that makes it fun and crazy. It is the best when it is match point, everyone in the Fieldhouse is on their feet yelling, and then BYU gets a hard kill to win.”
After a practice prior to the BYU vs. UCLA match in the Smith Fieldhouse, junior outside hitter Alex DaPron expressed his appreciation for the BYU fans who show up to support the men’s volleyball team at home games.
“I know a lot of teams don’t like playing [in the Smith Fieldhouse],” DaPron said. “One, because of the altitude. Two, because we have a pretty large fan base right on top of them. So the more fans we can get out here, the more energy we’ll have and hopefully the better we’ll play.”
