With all the recent talk about decreasing attendance among Cameron Crazies at Duke men's basketball games, Krzyzewskiville may have run into an unfathomable problem—a shortage of tenters for the Tobacco Road rivalry.
A year after experiencing astronomical registration numbers for tents in Krzyzewskiville for the highly anticipated Duke-North Carolina game, there are still spots available for white tenting—the shortest period of tenting offered for a guaranteed spot into the upcoming March 7 matchup in Cameron Indoor Stadium.
Each year, line monitors set up the Race to the Secret Spots, in which students must follow clues and sign in at different locations on campus to receive a white tenting spot. Usually this event is needed to accommodate the large number of groups that want to tent, and last year 30 white tenting spots and 30 flex tenting spots were filled. However, this year is different, with spots in white tenting still open for groups to register, according to a post in the Krzyzewskiville Piazza group from co-vice president of tenting Trevor Stevenson. The fact that there are white tents available confirms that fewer than 30 groups participated in the race.
"There is still space available in KVille for more White tents. They will be filled on a first come, first served basis. The registration form will be posted soon!" Stevenson stated Tuesday afternoon on the forum.
Regarding how many groups participated in the Race to the Secret Spots, line monitor Thomas Williford said he "[believed] the number was around 10."
In 2019, more than 150 groups signed up to tent on the first day of registration and a trivia test had to be used to determine which 70 would have a spot outside Cameron Indoor Stadium. According to Krzyzewskiville's official website, 65 tents have registered and only 41 are currently set up as the blue tenting period, the middle-length session, comes to a close Feb. 8.
The Chronicle reached out to co-head line monitors Maddie Manning and Ben Succop numerous times for comment Monday and Tuesday but received no initial response. They responded Wednesday afternoon, a day after this article's initial publication, confirming that there are still white tenting spots available. However, Succop would not confirm the number of groups that participated in the race.
There are many potential reasons for the decrease in interest for this year's game, starting with the Tar Heels' recent performance. Despite ascending to No. 5 in the AP poll earlier this season, North Carolina currently holds a 10-12 record and is tied for last in the ACC. The day of the game will also be the first day of spring break for Duke students, and it's hard to match the anticipation from last year's game that featured a top-3 matchup, Zion Williamson and Barack Obama.
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