USC Gamecock fans snapping up online Final Four goods, tickets

The South Carolina Gamecock men’s basketball team’s historic and unexpected trip to the Final Four in Phoenix is having a big impact on the online retail world.

Sales of online merchandise and secondary market tickets are soaring, according to online ticket seller StubHub and retailer fanatics.com.

These are their numbers and data, not ours (see Rhode Island):

3,000 percent

That’s the number StubHub says tickets sales from South Carolina jumped from before the Elite Eight game against Florida and after. (We’ve asked for the raw numbers. Still waiting. Maybe something about proprietary blah blah blah.)

By contrast, the snobby, er, more experienced Other Carolina fans’ ticket sales rose less than 4 percent pre- and post-Elite Eight. Perhaps the Tar Heels have been there before – could be.

Gonzaga fans have purchased the most tickets online, with South Carolina second, according to the service, although no raw numbers were provided.

660 percent

That is the increase in Gamecock merchandise nationwide before and after the Elite Eight, according to the Fanatics, a licensed sports merchandising company.

Gonzaga led in this category, with a sales jump topping 825 percent. Oregon came in at 325 percent and UNC trailed at 110 percent.

The whopping majority of those sales are fans snapping up anything with Final Four and the team’s name on it, the vast majority being T-shirts, a spokesman for the company said.

Rhode Island? Really?

The Tar Heels lead Final Four online merchandise sales in 25 states. Gonzaga sold the most items in 11 states.

Oregon has a lock on nine states, and South Carolina is leading in five states.

Those five state are South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Maryland and Rhode Island.

Wait, Rhode Island? There’s a Newport-based Gamecock Nation?

“We don’t know,” the spokesman said. “That’s what the data show.”

NYC baby!

The title for the most Gamecock merchandise sold by city, of course, goes to Columbia. That is followed by Charlotte, Greenville, New York City and Atlanta.

Nice to see the Big Apple represent. Sweet Sixteen. Madison Square Garden. The Mason Jar. Who loves you baby?

But where is Charleston?

“Maybe they came in sixth,” the spokesman said.

This story was originally published March 31, 2017 at 4:55 PM with the headline "USC Gamecock fans snapping up online Final Four goods, tickets."