SMS
RSS feeds
Reddit
NewsvineIn an effort to ensure home field advantage for Saturday’s Big Game, the Stanford Athletics Department has expanded the Red Zone student section by 1,400 seats.
Enlarge
The move comes as University officials adjust to increased demand for tickets in the renovated Stanford Stadium and a new program granting free admission to undergraduate and graduate students.
“Cal’s undergraduate population is four times the size of Stanford’s, so when we travel there we’re really outnumbered,” said Danny Arbeiter ‘08, a member of the Axe Committee. “We try to avoid that in our stadium.”
But as the University works to boost student attendance, general admission to the stadium has seen a ticket crunch. This year’s Big Game is the first in the new $100 million dollar Stanford Stadium, which was completed in fall 2006 and is smaller in seating capacity — down about 35,000 from the old stadium’s capacity of 85,000.
Almost 8,000 students signed up for free tickets in the Red Zone, said Bob Carruesco, assistant athletic director for marketing, which led the Athletic Department to increase the student section from 3,000 to 4,400 seats. The expanded section will begin at around the 40-yard line and wrap around the adjacent south end zone, where the Band will be relocated.
Season ticket holders in the affected sections have been moved to “comparable seats,” Carruesco said.
The Athletics Department debuted a new points system this season to handle increased demand for Big Game tickets. Students get one point for each game attended, and students with two or more points will receive priority entrance to Big Game. Students who signed up for the Red Zone prior to a summer cutoff date received an extra bonus point, so “anyone who has shown any interest in football should be able to come and get in,” Arbeiter said.
The Red Zone will also open up to any student regardless of points 45 minutes prior to kickoff, Arbeiter added.
“Students are encouraged to get there early,” he said. “It’s going to be a free-for-all.”
Big Game attendance averaged around 60,000 in the old stadium, which allowed plenty of room for student overflow. The biggest student section for a Big Game was just under 5,000 in the late 1990s.
“I think this will be the biggest crowd [in the new stadium],” Carruesco said, adding that the game “is, for all intents and purposes, sold out.”
While Stanford has worked to ensure as many of its own students as possible can attend Big Game, the smaller size of the new Stanford Stadium has left many Cal fans without tickets. Historically, the Big Game draws over 40,000 Berkeley faithful, but Stanford has reserved only about 15,000 tickets for Cal, the same number the University typically reserves for visiting teams. A third of those tickets will go to students and the Cal band.
The ticket scramble has led hundreds of Cal fans to buy Stanford season ticket packages, with ticket plans that include a Big Game ticket.
“Yeah, it’s difficult for Cal [with the smaller stadium],” Carruesco said. “They used to have as much room as they wanted, but now there’s much greater demand.”
Demand has not skyrocketed however; as of press time tickets were available at popular Web sites like StubHub or Craigslist at or below face value. Stanford is on a five-game losing streak and Cal has lost five of its last six games. While the rivalry is always a big draw, tickets would have been even scarcer if the teams had continued to win, Carruesco said.
“But that’s a good headache to have,” he said. “God only knows we need more of that.”