When tailgate was far from the stadium though attendance was awful. It actually did help attendance a lot when the 1500-3000 students were right there where they could just walk in. But remember the conference championship seasons when we still had horrible attendance late in the season because everyone stayed at tailgate?
I have spoken with several people in the athletic department and close to the football team who have told me that if the athletic fee would've passed there was a plan to remove the track from the football field. A several year plan was in place to massively renovate and improve Homer Bryce stadium to make it a premiere FCS stadium.
Important to note that after the win over West Virginia in basketball, many people in the athletic department were talking about the importance of us getting a real football stadium so we could go to an FBS conference. Not that anyone expects us to be successful at the FBS level but because being in a bigger conference means more money, more television exposure, better recruits, and better quality in home games.
Of course once the athletic fee was shot down, a lot of those plans were put on indefinite hold.