Miami football allowing limited fan capacity for UAB opener

In a report from the Miami Herald on Monday morning, the Miami Hurricanes will follow the lead from the Miami Dolphins and limit their capacity to 13,000 fans per game during the 2020 season.

Florida governor Ron DeSantis is having a press conference on Monday to announce that a capacity of 13,000 will be permitted at games Miami Dolphins and  Miami football program during the 2020 season. No expectation of how the Hurricanes will determine who is able to attend is expected currently.

Miami athletic director Blake James stated earlier this summer that the priority for attendance is the family of the Hurricanes players, recruits and students. Expect for high-level donors to somehow be worked into that as well. The expectation of which donors will attend is likely to be determined by donation points.

James and University of Miami President Julio Frenk have been transparent all summer about wanting fans to be able to attend football games during the 2020 season if feasible. With Frenk who is an expert in pandemics and the former health minister of Mexico leading the way, the Hurricanes will take all precautions necessary.

James told the Miami Herald in an interview last week that there was a good chance that fans would not be allowed to attend Hurricanes games at Hard Rock Stadium. The developments on Monday are encouraging but not surprising with DeSantis involved. The Florida governor has been widely criticized for his COVID-19 policies.

"“I am of the mindset that there is a very good chance we will not have fans…I am hoping we will be able to have fans. That’s something that’s up to Miami-Dade County, the government leadership, and whatever decision they make I’ll be 100 percent supportive of. It’s going to be a significant hit on our revenues,Right now we don’t know what the level of that hit is going to be because we’re still working through what potential fans we’ll have in place. And once we find out the amount of fans we have in place, we don’t know what September, October, November, even this year we have a game in December, any of those months are going to look like.We may look at it right now and say, ‘OK, we have 11 games and six home games and if the decision is made to be at 25 percent here, what will be our potential ticket revenue?’ But we don’t know what’s going to happen in any of the months.The hit will be significant but we probably won’t know what the exact number is until we’re through the season."

Allowing 13,000 per game means the Miami football program loses 80 percent of the capacity. Miami averaged 52,829 fans per home game in 2019. With Florida State at home September 26 in a normal season, that number would have improved in 2020. As James said the loss in revenue will be significant to Miami in 2020.

As the Miami football program and 75 other FBS teams playing college football advance through the season the actual amount of lost revenue will be determined more accurately. The lost revenue will have a great impact on non-revenue sports. Miami has not had to eliminate any sports programs yet but it is something to monitor.