Victor Hale II

April 16th, 2013 at 11:03 AM ^

I'd be curious to see statistics on false starts (and maybe turnovers as well) by the visiting team.  To me, that is a decent indicator of the crowd rattling the offense.  Therein lies the real homefield advantage.

MGoStrength

April 16th, 2013 at 11:08 AM ^

That's interesting because I always hear criticism that our home field advantage isn't as good as some other places like OSU because our stadium isn't as loud due the structural layout or whatever.  But, our home winning record speaks for itself.  I do think the renovations and bigger press box and luxery boxes seems to have created a louder atmosphere by keeping the sound in the stadium more, but I'm going off what I hear on television.  For those that actually attend the games does it sound any louder?  And, is it just me but fan excitement the past few years seems pretty high.

rob f

April 16th, 2013 at 11:33 AM ^

as I sit in Sec 36 (North end zone, looking directly down eastern sideline).  As I see it, the Student Section actually feeds off from us and the general frenzy eminating from my section. 

Thats my story and I'm sticking to it!

jmdblue

April 16th, 2013 at 11:35 AM ^

in noise level between pre and post renovatioins is remarkable...This is especially true when considering the decrease in noise when they lowered the field and put real grass in 20 or so years prior to the boxes going in.  I don't want the astroturf back, but I'd be curious to hear what the 70's lower stadium configuration would sound like in combination with the current upper stadium.

Regardless...as long as we have the current encampmnent of octogenarians between the 20s we wont be as loud as the 80,000 truckers down south. 

danimal1968

April 16th, 2013 at 2:10 PM ^

they did prior to 1969 and from 1991 to 2002 (which is what he's talking about - the field was lowered in 1991 as part of putting the natural grass surface in, which unfortunately put the field below the water table and led to all kinds of drainage problems).

M-Wolverine

April 16th, 2013 at 2:59 PM ^

Astroturf was basically sandpaper over cement. It would reflect sound pretty well. The new field turf is more like fabric on rubber. 

I much prefer the new stuff because players don't get killed on it, but the original poster was right in that it could be louder.

MGoStrength

April 16th, 2013 at 1:40 PM ^

That's a good call, but I think the excitement also seems to be very dependant on the situation of the game and the score.  It has to be a close game, it typically nees to be against a quality foe (MSU, ND, OSU, Neb, PSU, and the like), and we have to actually be good.  So, when we have crappy years they don't seem to get as into it.  When it's an opponent like Central, they don't seem to get as into it.  And, if we are either losing or winning big they don't seem to get as into it.  But, you're right on the money that we have some big homes games which all appear will be closely contested which would be ideal scenarios for them to get amped up.  I hope we find that to be the case.

RadioMuse

April 16th, 2013 at 11:31 AM ^

Ever since the boxes have gone in and the winning ways have returned it's been getting pretty loud in Michigan Stadium.  The 2012 season wasn't as noisy as 2011 what with UTL Notre Dame (loudest game I've experienced) and Ohio State...  It got pretty loud and people got on their feed when we really needed them to.

And we're perfect at home the last two seasons:  8-0 in 2011, 6-0 in 2012.  I'm not sure if 14 ranks as the longest home win streak or not?  I know Wisconsin and LSU were both doing better than that before the 2012 season, but both took home losses this year and Ohio State took several home losses in 2011.  Obviously Alabama has their loss to A&M blemishing their home schedule...  Oregon lost to Stanford at home...Standfor lost to Oregon at home in 2011... etc etc.

WolverineHistorian

April 16th, 2013 at 11:45 AM ^

How often you win at home really should be the main factor when figuring out home field advantage.  But America only seems to care about how loud the stadium is when it comes to this topic. 

During Lloyd Carr's first ten seasons, we had a record of 58-6 at home.  Only Oklahoma had a better home record during that time by 1 game.  But nobody even thought to mention the big house as having a home field advantage.  

LJ

April 16th, 2013 at 1:42 PM ^

Shouldn't the metric adjust for the quality of your team though?  To me, a large difference between home winning percentage and road winning percentage would indicate a strong home field advantage, though of course it might just indicate that you're not a very good road team.

Tater

April 16th, 2013 at 11:53 AM ^

The structure helps, and the bandwagoneers are acting like real fans again.  The team once again has the personnel to slap down the lesser programs, and stay in the game against the "big boys."  

I would still like to see opposing teams show a bit more fear, but hopefully that will come with time.

Darth Wolverine

April 16th, 2013 at 11:56 AM ^

Tough games this coming season though. Ohio, ND, and Nebraska are probably the hardest for the home games.

MGoBender

April 16th, 2013 at 6:34 PM ^

Well, about 35-40% of students are from out of state.  A significant portion of those are unfamiliar with Michigan athletics and I think it is safe to say the kinder sex usually is not as interested in football as us guys.

Let's face it: Until the athletic department actually makes students go out of their way to purchase tickets (i.e. more than a checkbox during your fall class registration or whatever it is now), there will be east-coast sorority types that have no interest in the game whatsoever, but will buy the tickets because they aren't paying for it anyway.

There needs to be actual consequences for not using your tickets and/or chronic tardiness.  I'd rather have 1,500 fewer student tickets sold - that probably doesn't hurt the student attendance if you're taking them away from offenders - and get those tickets to bodies that will show up.

snarling wolverine

April 16th, 2013 at 6:52 PM ^

But all that has been true forever, and yet students didn't have that much of a problem coming to games on time until the last few years.  It was definitely not this bad when I was a student a decade ago.  I don't mind them putting some teeth into the ticket policy, but I don't see why it's even come to that.

 

 

keep_em_honest

April 16th, 2013 at 12:58 PM ^

People at the stadium are plenty loud (minus the well heeled near the 50, but you'll find that at any major University, excluding the SEC).  I tend to think it has more to do with the Bowl design where some of the seats are a long distance horizontally from the field.  Stadiums like Ohio or PSU that go "up" rather than "out" are more conducive to creating and holding sound.

The renovations have definately made it louder though.

 

snarling wolverine

April 16th, 2013 at 5:33 PM ^

I don't think the shape of the stadium is that big of a deal.  There are definitely times when the Big House is absolutely rocking.  We just have a lot of fans who don't make that much noise.   In any given game, I'm generally the loudest person in my section, or very close to it.  There are a lot of fans who don't want to make noise, or at least not until late in the game.

 

 

LSAClassOf2000

April 16th, 2013 at 1:35 PM ^

...here's Stadium Journey's detailed breakdown of the formula they used, and they actually use Michigan in the example and compare it to the same calculations made with other schools' numbers on each metric. (HERE)

Essentially, it is:

1.5(home win pct.) + (fan rating from their site) + (reverse ranking of avg. attendance / # of FBS schools) + (% capacity up to 100%) / 1.5 + (home team points / total scored at stadium) / 1.5. 

For Michigan, that means:

1.5(1) + (5/5) + (124/124) + (100%/1.5) + (231/327)/1.5

 - We were 6-0 at home, so 6/6

 - We were first in avg. attendance, so the reverse ranking is 124, thus 124/124

 - They maxed out capacity at 100% (Michigan was at 102.4%)

TeamRankings actually does Home Power Ratings for football, and we were #11 nationally and #3 in the conference last year in their metric, which is largely based on record versus the Top 25, teams in the 26-50 range, and so on down. 

 

 

JamieH

April 16th, 2013 at 3:07 PM ^

Using Win% is not really mathematically sound.   A great team could play in an empty stadium and still have a good win percentage.  Conversly a terrible team could play in the greatest stadium on earth and still never win a game.   Win% has far more to do with team strength and strength of schedule than it does stadium effect.

In order to really measure stadium effect, you have to look at actual outcomes vs expected outcomes and look for trends.  So essentially, does a team significantly overperform vs. expectations at home?  In an extreme case that could still mean going 0-6, but if they SHOULD be getting blown out by 3 touchdowns because they are terrible but they are keeping games at home close that could point to a great home field advantage. 

M-Wolverine

April 16th, 2013 at 5:00 PM ^

Where someone did a study and found the only real home road difference was the influence fans had on the refs making calls? Everything else was pretty much even, and more or less so in some sports than others.