Falcons maintain optimism about their future |
|
|
| |
May 9, 2011
By Chris Maza
Reminder Assistant Editor
SPRINGFIELD — It was a season that ended like many others in recent history for the Springfield Falcons.
The City of Home's hometown hockey club missed the playoffs for the eighth straight year and failed to have a winning record in 13 seasons.
Still, President and General Manager Bruce Landon saw plenty of things this year that have him believing his club is on the right path.
"What I found, and what I think a lot of fans found, was that this was a pretty exciting team to watch," Landon said.
The Falcons finished with a record of 35-40-2-3, good for 75 points — an improvement over last season's 66-point effort — and were a competitive team for the majority of the season and were in playoff contention for the better part of the season.
"It really depends on how you define success," Landon told Reminder Publications. "I think it was [successful]. I think our affiliation with Columbus has been successful thus far. They made efforts in the off-season to sign players that could help us and come training camp when we found we had some holes, they made efforts to bring in some other guys to help fill those holes."
The Falcons were successful until the month of March when the team lost impact players Tom Sestito and Dane Byers to trade. Shortly afterward, the Falcons had to deal with a rash of injuries and through that month, which included 13 games, the Falcons lost 12, including 11 straight.
They ended the season strong, however, with a 4-2 mark in April, aided by the addition of some former Hockey East players — University of Massachusetts goalie Paul Dainton, Boston College forward Cam Atkinson and Northeastern forward Wade MacLeod.
"The trade that Columbus made had a little more impact than we all thought it would," Landon said. "Then with the injuries, we lost about four key players in the span of a week."
The team also received good news this season when Charlie Pompea purchased the team, offering some stability after Landon's exhaustive search for new ownership.
"The relationship has been terrific. Charlie spends his winters in Florida for the most part, but we talked almost everyday," Landon said. "He's become a fan and can relate now with our fans and what has been going on here the past few years."
With the season now over, the Falcons front office is aggressively attacking the off-season in hopes of not only building the team, but also building a better fan experience to boost ticket sales and help secure the team's future in Springfield.
"The bottom line is we have to sell tickets. It's the same every year," Landon said. "We have to build the fan base and reach that average of 4,000 fans a game if we want to be able to keep doing this. That's the message."
The Falcons did see a modest increase in attendance this season, averaging 3,717 fans per game. The 2009-2010 Falcons averaged 3,644 spectators.
"In March and April when we weren't doing as well we were averaging 700 or 800 more fans than the rest of the season, mostly through group ticket packages," Landon said. "Anytime you have growth, whether it be 100 more fans or 10 more fans, you're heading in the right direction."
This year with new Internet tools such as Facebook and Twitter at their disposal, the Falcons are reaching out to the community in an attempt to maintain current fans' interest in the team, while also generating new interest to expand the fan base.
"It's a very important aspect of what we do and it's something we try to do every year," Landon said of the community outreach. "But this year with Facebook and Twitter, we are able to reach more people and it really seems to be catching on."
Landon said fans could expect new promotions next season, as the team is exploring trends around the league that have been successful. He also said the team plans to bring its merchandizing back in-house in order to offer more quality souvenirs after outsourcing that aspect of the business in recent seasons.
|
Comments From Our Readers:
|
|
|
