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GREENSBORO — Cheaper single-game ticket sales could be in the future of the ACC men's basketball tournament, officials say.

That kind of availability could mean more of the public could get access to the tournament than before, meaning more people in the seats.

With a new ticket redistribution plan in place after a 2010 dip in attendance, both the ACC and Greensboro Coliseum officials have the same mission: Fill the arena.

Karl Hicks, director of men's basketball operations for the ACC, said Thursday that N.C. State and Virginia Tech each have the most ticket books, about 125 each, to sell.

To move more tickets in future tournaments, scaled pricing and single-game tickets could be added.

"Is the price point right?" Hicks said, calling the event the "crown jewel" of the ACC.

"The day when the front-row seat and the top seat in the upper level are priced the same, they may be over," Hicks said. "Seems to me that that makes sense."

For years the ACC tournament was something that athletics boosters and their friends accessed, while scalpers made bank on the secondary market.

In 2010, single-session attendance was down by as much as 20 percent, compared to 2006, the previous time the 12-team tournament was played in Greensboro. Scalpers resold tickets for far less than face value.

This year, again, all tickets have the same price on them, and they were sold in full-weekend books. But this could be the last year fans see that for the ACC men's tournament.

One analyst suggests there are opportunities beyond the games for spectators.

"If you're going to keep fans, you have to create more meaningful experiences in the arena or in the stadium," said Rick French, chairman and CEO of French West Vaughan, a Raleigh public relations firm.

His group works with the CIAA men's and women's tournaments in Charlotte.

The concerts and parties — not just the games — draw crowds of more than 170,000 to the city during a week.

The Division II tournament for a conference of historically black schools draws the third-largest crowds of any NCAA conference tournament, behind the ACC and Big Ten, according to French West Vaughan.

"It is less about the games and which teams advance," French said, "and more about the fact that it is a reunion, a cultural reunion."

The ACC's tournament isn't in dire straits. Nearly 94,000 fans went to 2010 games.

But ACC commissioner John Swofford has acknowledged that work is ahead for the conference's marquee event.

Scaling tickets and breaking up books of tickets could be part of that, he told the Raleigh Sports Club on Feb. 16, according to a Capital Sports Report blog report.

"We need to look at that," Swofford said.

Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski talked about attendance for men's basketball after a Feb. 20 game against Georgia Tech.

"We've taken for granted the golden goose for a long time," he said, "and you have to look at the old goose and to see if it's still golden and how to — if it's not — how to get it there."

Already, the ticket distribution method has changed.

For the first time this year, schools could take more or fewer tickets for the tournament, based on what they expected boosters would want. Previously, all schools received an equal share.

But for the future, the basketball games themselves may not be the only selling point for fans.

The events — a fan fest, the ACC Hall of Champions and other events are trending to that off-court end of action.

Each year a university day occurs between Friday's two-game sessions, for alumni of each school to meet and hang out.

Matt Brown, the coliseum's director, said that the crowd is older and that it's not the draw that it once was.

Traditionally the alumni have met at tables and talked. But there are plans to make changes by 2013, the next time the event will be in Greensboro, possibly including musical entertainment.

"We're making it a more lively atmosphere, we're making it a more general room, (not) regimented off," Brown said.

"Maybe not make it so stiff and rigid and deferential. Like you're at a big picnic atmosphere, like the CIAA atmosphere.

"Maybe if we put a band in there."

French said it's something that's long been happening in NASCAR. Tickets often include infield performances by top country artists.

"Even the NFL learned that about the Super Bowl," French said. "Obviously there's a mass of ticket demands. Twice as many people come to the host city just to be around the event."

Contact Gerald Witt at 373-7008 or gerald.witt@news-record.com