Three Big Ten programs and not Alabama Football have the largest number of fans nationwide. In a poll conducted by SBRnet, the Crimson Tide was No. 6 among 65 college football programs ranked.
Above the Crimson Tide were No. 1 Ohio State, No. 2, Michigan and No. 3, Penn State. The survey included people who attended or watched a college football game in the 2022 season.
When the same survey was done last year, Alabama Football was No. 2 overall. Ohio State was No. 1 last year as well.
Although Alabama’s fan numbers slipped nationally, the Crimson Tide actually grew its fan numbers across the south. Survey respondents were categorized into four geographic areas of the nation; the South, North East, North Central and the West.
In the South segment, Alabama was No. 1, after being No. 3 last year, behind No. 2, Texas and No. 1, Georgia.
The survey calculated the 65 teams had a total of 94.1M fans. The number of total fans by region is quite interesting.
- South – 40.5M fans
- North Central – 22.5M
- North East – 12.6M
- West – 18.6M
Another tabulation is an example of how far the college football world has moved to a Power Two, with every conference except the Big Ten and the SEC playing catch up. Using the 32 teams the two conferences will field in 2024, combined the B1G and the SEC have 58.3M fans. That is 61.9% of all the fans measured by the survey. The B1G number is well ahead of the SEC, at 33.6M, compared to 24.7M. The SEC will have six teams calculated to have less than 1M fans. The Big Ten will only have four.
Media deals are driven by the calculation of eyeballs, rather than measuring the number of TV households in markets. That is why the Pac12 is in such big trouble. After the exit of UCLA and USC, in the Pac-??, the largest fanbase will be Arizona State’s 1.36M. The University of Kentucky football fanbase is larger.
Alabama Football Fan Numbers, plus other SEC teams
- Alabama Crimson Tide – 3.4M, down from 4.1M last year
- Georgia Bulldogs – 3.1M
- LSU Bengal Tigers – 2.5M
- Texas Longhorns – 2.4M
- Texas A&M Aggies – 2.3M
- Oklahoma Sooners – 1.6M
- Florida Gators – 1.6M
- Tennessee Vols – 1.5M
- Kentucky Wildcats – 1.46M
- Auburn Tigers – 1.1M
- Arkansas Razorbacks – 940K
- Missouri Tigers – 882K
- South Carolina Gamecocks – 856K
- Mississippi State Bulldogs – 402K
- Ole Miss Rebels – 359K
- Vanderbilt Commodores – 173K
A common trend in calculating fan data is that National Championship teams gain fans. Despite that, Georgia with back-to-back National Championships has still not caught up with the Crimson Tide.
The total fan number calculated for the Ohio State Buckeyes is impressive – a whopping 6.2M fans.