Michigan State Football: Almost everything about the Penn State game is wrong
By Ryan Kay
Season ticket holders and fans in the great Lansing area who attend multiple games a season and arguably along with the students who currently attend the school, may not be able to cheer on and support their favorite team in person as the Spartans play the Nittany Lions at Ford Field and not at Spartan Stadium.
To put it in perspective, Michigan State football season ticket holders will not have their tickets for the Penn State honored but will “have the opportunity to purchase tickets in Spartan Fund donor priority order and the game at Ford Field will be sold as a standalone contest, with details, including on-sale dates, to be announced in the near future”.
In other words, they will be refunded for that game ticket as well as for parking for that game. However, that doesn’t tell the whole story. When loyal and dedicated fans purchase season tickets, and they make a financial commitment to the football program showing they support Michigan State football by spending hundreds if not thousands of dollars on the tickets, parking, seat licensing fee, and other fees and taxes, it should be a dual commitment between the season ticket holders and the football program they support financially.
When season ticket holders bought and or renewed their season tickets for the upcoming season starting back in March of this year, they expected to attend seven home games with one of them being against a top-tier opponent in Penn State. Now, they will be able to only have six games to attend at Spartan Stadium with the last true home game being Nov. 4 against Nebraska.
Another misconception is that current students of Michigan State who are student section season ticket holders would not attend the game even if it was home at Spartan Stadium and because so many of them live in Metro Detroit, they will be home for the holiday weekend and more likely to attend the game at Ford Field instead.
There is no evidence of this whatsoever and it is being thrown around as the truth that 90% of students at Michigan State live in Metro Detroit. There are arguably more fans and alums of the University of Michigan in the tri-county area of Metro Detroit in Macomb, Wayne, and Oakland counties than Michigan State fans and alums. They are a large group of Michigan State students and alums who live in or nearby cities like Grand Rapids, Chicago, and other parts of the Midwest.
What evidence is there that the game at Ford Field will be a better “home advantage” environment with the stadium packed with Spartans fans? Lower-priced tickets? More seating than Spartan Stadium? Michigan State fans pack stadiums of neutral site games in many cases? The answer to all those questions is no.
Michigan State played at Ford Field, against Florida Atlantic in September of 2010. The game was part of a home-and-home series with the Owls and Florida Atlantic couldn’t host the Spartans due to their new Stadium not being completed so the “away” game was held in Detroit. The crowd for the game at Ford Field against Florida Atlantic only drew just over 36 thousand fans. In comparison, Michigan State averaged between 73 and 74 thousand fans that season at Spartan Stadium.
Even if the game sells out, Ford Field holds approximately 65 thousand in comparison to the capacity of Spartan Stadium which holds just over 75 thousand fans. That is a difference of 10 thousand fans between the schools. No one is claiming that the last three home games against Penn State were sell-out crowds but the myth being used that they were “low” attend games are lies without any evidence to back it up.
There are no guarantees or promises that ticket prices will be lower or even more easily available for purchase for Michigan State fans for this game against Penn State at Ford Field. Will the majority of season ticket holders buy tickets for this game? Will current students who are student sections season ticket holders from the greater Lansing area and Grand Rapids buy tickets and attend this game? They are no clear answers to those questions and more than likely, fewer Michigan State football fans will attend this game as opposed to if it was at Spartan Stadium in East Lansing.