Largest College Football Fanbase?

[Rickyvol77]

I've been in over 32 states and 6 countries and I have met Vol fans at random in nearly every place I have ever been

 

[VFL-82-JP]

I suspect most of us would be surprised at Syracuse's fan base.

New York State has about 19 million people. Almost half of those are in the city, which who knows what teams they follow. But once you get upstate, with the other roughly 10 million folks, it's all about Syracuse University. From Buffalo to Albany to Binghamton, and everything in between, it's all about Syracuse.

So there's a potential fan base one and a half times the size of the state of Tennessee's population. They simply have a larger base to build from.

And yes, folks there follow football. Basketball is #1 to Syracuse fans, of course, but football is a bigger draw for them than many of us seem to think.

So yeah, I'm not surprised they're on that list. I agree with Ricky, though: Tennessee is being sold short in that count: I've always heard our fan base numbers in the mid-4million range, like 4.5 give or take.

Go Vols!


EDIT: And p.s., Tennessee's population has boomed in the past few decades, from below 5m in 1990 to more than 7m today. A lot of those folks are transplants from other states, and bring their loyalties along. But some of them will embrace the local lads, and even more of their children and grandchildren will.

So when I said the Vols' fan base has long been 4.5m or so, I think maybe that's getting dated, too. We might be significantly higher, maybe above 5m by now. Need a new survey by folks who know how to run valid ones. And no, not by some station up in Connecticut whose employees tend to think anything west of Philadelphia is just "fly over country" populated by trailer parks.

 

[Savannahbayvol]

Fanatics Best-Selling Schools (2024 regular season and CFP):

1. Notre Dame
2. Ohio State
3. Georgia
4. Texas
5. Tennessee
6. Alabama
7. Michigan
8. Oregon
9. Penn State
10. Florida

Looks pretty accurate to me. Ratings based on 4 factors:

Natural affinity- how many Catholics are there in the country

State population- probably only 3 states listed, Tennessee, Oregon and Alabama not in Top 10 population size

In addition to population itself, number of Major college programs instate... Can you imagine if Texas was the only major program instate. Great advantage for tOSU and us to a lesser extent. UGA only has GT with a rather limited student body and support.

And I almost forgot, great winning tradition.

Gambling tip from a professional player in Las Vegas. These teams always have maybe a 2 point differential in the books because they realize many in these huge fan bases will bet on their team no matter what the odds.

Gonna be at Harrahs Lake Tahoe for our UAB game day.

 

[TCNC53]

I highly doubt we have fewer fans than Syracuse.

I don’t even believe the number compared to Auburn. And USC? They’re too busy crying about all the issues in CA to care about college football. The VOLS are ranked a bit too low here but whatever. GBO.

 

[Hoosier_Vol]

Wisconsin & Syracuse??? I could see maybe Nebraska but Badgers & The Orange?? C'mon now!

 

[89 VOLS grad]

The fact that Neyland has 100k seats and is consistently the most expensive ticket in the country since Covid ought to tell you a little. The above estimates may be correct in terms of casual fans but they don’t measure intensity. I am not saying we are number one but we aren’t that far down. Below Auburn? Come on! Go on social media (Twitter and Facebook) and look at followers for the major sports. That might give a better picture.

This is a very good analysis. Most weeks for the past few years I have looked at prices of tickets for games for most every team. The REAL UT is often the highest ticket on the market at home or away. The supply and demand curve for tickets should tell someone a lot about the number of fans. Unless, it just means the hardcore that have to be at most or every game in person only applies to UT fans and a few others! I know hundreds of fans just myself that are big fans that don't attend the games due to the crazy high prices these days. I can't imagine UT having less than 5 million fans! Hell, there are over 300 million in the US. If only a third of them claim to follow any college team, that is 100 million. If we are in the top 15, there is no reason to think UT has less than 5 million fans!

I would say UGA is too low too due to the football team's success the last 5 years and the size of Atlanta and population of the whole state. They haven't had the baseball and basketball UT has had in the last 5 years. I would still say they are above 5 million too!

 

[Berry4Heisman14]

I’m 32 and noticed as a teenager even in Tennessee kids my age didn’t like Tennessee. This was when we were down and awful. I knew more people my age in Tennessee that rooted for Alabama than for the vols. Us being awful for so long didn’t help.