Here's a suggestion for a marketing slogan when University of Hawai'i football season tickets go on sale to new customers beginning June 26:

"Even more good seats available this year."

Exactly 11.6 percent more than this time last year, actually. Because that's the number of season-ticket holders from the same point in 2005 that did not renew for 2006, according to figures provided by the athletic department.

While 16,300 season-ticket holders did put their checks in the mail, a figure that would delight most schools in the Western Athletic Conference, the steady drop from 23,705 at the same point in 2001 should be sobering news in Manoa for several reasons.

There could be a bigger jolt in store if total sales end up falling below 20,000 for the first time in a quarter-century. That might happen if new sales and student, faculty and staff numbers don't pick up the slack and reach last year's already sagging 20,426 total.

That would be a significant blow as UH tries to balance its checkbook after four consecutive deficit years and what an independent auditor says is a $4.6 million accumulated debt.

It would be one thing for renewals to drop after a 5-7 overall finish if 2006 portended another disappointment. But with a positive preseason buzz about a team that returns the components of an exciting offense, that's hardly the case.

You shudder to think what it might have been if UH was heavily rebuilding or Aloha Stadium had imposed the alcohol ban.

Last year's drop was not unexpected given the premium fee hikes that had been imposed. But now it looks like UH is still feeling the fallout, especially since there is no defending national champion Southern California to take some of the sting out of it for ticket buyers.

It suggests that a lot of people were willing to bite the bullet for one season if it meant USC, but weren't about to ante up again for Purdue, Oregon State, Eastern Illinois and Nevada-Las Vegas amid familiar concerns about parking, alcohol, etc. It can't be all hung on the pay-per-view option, either, since those sales have dropped, too.

An exciting, winning football team, as the 2006 Warriors would seem to promise, can go part of the way toward stopping the decline. But the drop in sales says there is a whole lot more in the equation that needs to be worked on, too.

And now there are even more fans to attempt to win back.

Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8044.