The Maryland football team posted an attendance increase of 13.8 percent this season from last, leading the Big Ten in the Terrapins' first year in the conference, via a press release from the conference.
One of the university's hopes when it announced a move from the ACC to the Big Ten in 2012 was that the new conference would push attendance numbers upward, and that has clearly happened.
Maryland filled Byrd Stadium to an average of 91 percent of capacity this season, while four of six home games hosted more than 50,000 spectators. For perspective, Maryland had only had one home game in the previous four years draw more than 50,000 fans.
The Terps' total home attendance, per the Big Ten, was 281,884 fans. That's an average of 46,981 fans per game, up from 36,023 in 2012 and 41,278 in 2013. The most-attended home games were 51,802-person sellouts against Ohio State and Michigan State. The lightest-attended game was last Saturday's loss to Rutgers, at 36,673.
The biggest jump in stage size occurred on the road. In their six away games, the Terps played in front of an average of 82,000 fans; up from an average of 50,000 road fans the year before. The Terps played before more than 100,000 fans at Penn State and Michigan and 80,000 fans at Wisconsin.
For the conference as a whole, it was a strong attendance year. The Big Ten eclipsed 6 million total fans for the third time in conference history, it said, setting its own record with 6,359,218 total fans attending games.