Thursday, January 14, 2010

JOHNSON CITY, Tenn. (Jan. 13, 2010) – Over the past two years, the ETSU women’s basketball grant team has been working hard to increase awareness of the sport and attendance at home games. On Wednesday morning, the team announced it has launched a new program to help generate both tactics by introducing the Dean’s Challenge.
 
“Our NCAA women’s basketball grant team is pleased to announce the kickoff of our inaugural Dean’s Challenge,” said Senior Associate Athletic Director Barbie Breedlove. “This unique challenge will pit the deans of our eight colleges against each other to see which college can generate the highest attendance at designated Lady Buccaneer home conference games. At the end, we have $3,000 in scholarships to award the winning colleges.”
 
This program, which will help create interest through ETSU staff and students on campus, was an idea created by the marketing department at Auburn University. Auburn, who introduced this program four years ago, has seen significant interest in the challenge and increase in attendance numbers at its women’s basketball games.

“Now in its fourth year, the Dean's Challenge has grown to be a key facet of our overall marketing efforts for women's basketball,” added Mike Hales, the Assistant Director for Marketing at Auburn.
"Each dean, along with their staffs, has truly embraced the initiative and has played a significant role in growing our attendance more and more each year."