Traveling to the Bowl Game

Submitted by mgoblue52 on

I'm a recent graduate and I was in the MMB so when I did go to bowl games, it was on the University's dime.

Now that I'm a proud alum, I'm excited to go to the bowl game on my own!  Just one question for the more experienced bowl travelers:

I'm assuming they announce the invitations next Sunday, and mgoblue will have info regarding tickets.  Do people usually just buy through our athletic department?

 

Who else is going to Tempe (probably)?

SFBlue

November 28th, 2010 at 10:59 PM ^

100% going if it's in Tempe.  Not as sure if it's in Jax'ville.

I have got tix through the athletic department before, with better results as an alum: as a student in the '03 Outback Bowl and '04 Rose Bowl, I had upper deck and end-zone seats, respectively, and as an alum I had very, very good seats to the '05 Rose Bowl (40 yardline--got through friend in Victors Club), '07 Rose Bowl (25 yard line), and '08 Citrus Bowl (20 yard line). 

Come to think of it, it may have been "first come first serve" as a student for some games, because I also remember sleeping overnight in the '98 Rose Bowl to get the seats I got (ca. 15 yard line).  Maybe the student seating policy changed at some point?

cheesheadwolverine

November 28th, 2010 at 11:13 PM ^

I'll probably be in Tempe that week regardless, so I'll definently be going if it's the Insight Bowl.  How much do these things cost typically?  And will there be more requests than tickets (diven that this is, sadly, not the Rose Bowl for the NC this year).

Zone Left

November 28th, 2010 at 11:20 PM ^

As low as $22 per ticket on fiestabowl.org (host stadium).  Sadly, tickets to the Fiesta Bowl and the Title Game aren't available, but tickets to "College Football's Biggest Party" on Jan 1st are still available.  I'm sure there will be be lots of different types of chips and salsa there.

Tacopants

November 29th, 2010 at 8:54 AM ^

You're probably looking at soemthing like $55/ticket.  If you want to sit with Michigan fans, your best bet is to go through students and/or the athletic department.

When we went to the Rose Bowl, each student had an alotment of 8 tickets they could buy.  Those were the days.

WolvinLA2

November 28th, 2010 at 11:19 PM ^

No doubt tickets will be available.  Sun Devil Stadium seats over 73k. which is about 37k per school.  Since neither us nor whichever school we play are terribly close, it might not even sell out.  UM didn't sell all of its seats to the Alamo Bowl in 2005, for example. 

Since we haven't been to a bowl in a while, a lot of M fans will want to go, but I don't think it will be too difficult to find tickets if you want them.

Tater

November 29th, 2010 at 12:05 AM ^

If they play Florida in Jax, any tix that don't go through the AD or a travel agency will probably take about two hours to sell out through Ticketmaster.  Even in a bad year, Gatorfans love them some Gators. 

M-Wolverine

November 29th, 2010 at 12:19 AM ^

You can check for tix on mgoblue or through the Alumni association. After that, it depends if you want to go on the cheap or in style. The school will have extra tickets for sure, but full price. But you can get them from the bowl directly, or there's always scalpers with tickets to burn because few sell out. The advantage of the Alumni/U tix is that they're usually in the Michigan section. How good can be a crapshoot, from the 40 to the endzone. The Alumni Association offers tours, and often (but not always) it involves the team hotel (which is going to be pricier than the local Motel 6), but they do tend toward the overpriced vs. what you could find on a Travelocity type thing. But usually that involves transport to and from the airport, charters, and a bus to the stadium, so you don't have to worry about the getting to places stuff. There's usually some souvenir doodads thrown in, and optional (read: more money) side trips to the local tourist attraction, to bowl luncheons and/or pep rally's.
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<br>Insight being new to Michigan, I can't really tell you much about it. Ditto Gator. Or Texas Bowl really. Lowest bowl we've been in lately had been the Alamo Bowl (Riverwalk, how I miss you).
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<br>Going? I've been to each one since 2000, but the economy has kinda nose dived along with our bowl prospects. I'm not sure paying to go practically to the west coast for a game we may struggle in that isn't named "Rose" is viable or wise. I'd probably prefer a shorter flight to Florida, or at least Houston because I have relatives I could crash with. But every location has pluses and minuses to different people. We'll see. TBD.

WolvinLA2

November 29th, 2010 at 1:41 AM ^

It's almost certainly a 50-50 shot whether we end up in the Insight or Gator Bowl  For those who don't know how this will play out:

Wisconsin will get the Rose Bowl, and Ohio State (likely) will get an at-large BCS bowl.  MSU is guaranteed the Cap One Bowl.  Then there's the Outback Bowl.  Since every Big Ten team left will finish 7-5, they can pick anyone.  We could be in the Outback Bowl.  Likely, they'll pick Iowa, but they could pick Penn State.  Then the Gator Bowl and Insight share the 5th and 6th picks.  If they pick different teams, they get the team they picked and we move to the next bowl.  If they pick the same team, there is a coin flip, the bowl that wins the flip gets the team they picked, and the other bowl takes their next choice.  The most likely scenario here is that the two teams in the Gator and Insight are whichever team the Outback doesn't pick (PSU and Iowa) and us.  If both pick PSU, we (likely) get the loser of the coin flip.  If they both pick us, we get the winner of the coin flip.  If one of them picks us and the other picks PSU, then we get whichever one picks us, but again, it's 50-50. 

Basically, that's a long way to say it's literally a coin flip whether we're in the Gator Bowl against the SEC or the Insight Bowl against the Big 12.  The only caveats are if the Outback Bowl gifts us a spot in their game or if one of Gator and Insight is dumb enough to pick Illinois over Michigan.  I don't think either caveat happens, but you never know. 

mgoblue52

November 29th, 2010 at 2:10 AM ^

I'm not challenging what you're saying because you probably know more than I do, but perhaps you could help clarify something.

While I have seen a couple projections sending us to Jacksonville, it seems like the majority of the projections have us going to Tempe.  Given what you said about preferences and coin flips, could that be because the Gator Bowl wants PSU and the Insight Bowl prefers us?

WolvinLA2

November 29th, 2010 at 2:17 AM ^

That could be the case.  If for some reason, although I don't know what that reason would be, it was known that Insight prefered Michigan over PSU and Gator preferred PSU over Michigan, there would be no coin flip.  However, that which makes PSU attractive to Gator doesn't really change for Insight, and the same goes for Michigan.  Geographically, PSU and UM are similarly situated to both bowls, same with their respective alumni bases. 

So, I guess that's possible, but I don't really know why it would be probably.

Wolverine318

November 29th, 2010 at 7:16 AM ^

Last time I went it was the rose bowl against USC. I bought tix through the AD. The alumni association also had sponsored hotel deals. I was on my own for the plane ticket. I also bought tickets for the university day at Universal Studios-LA through the alumni association. There also was a sponsored tailgate before the game. However, since it took me so long to get from the rose parade to the stadium, I missed the tailgate. I did most of the sightseeing in LA and Hollywood with my friends rather than the alumni association. It was a pricey trip, but I had a blast. 

This year, I am going to the bowl game if we are in florida since it is driving distance from my wife's parents house in Charleston, SC. I will just buy tickets through the AD and use travelocity for the hotel. 

Wolves

November 29th, 2010 at 4:50 PM ^

I've been to every bowl game since '96.  Every time I have chosen to buy from the UM AD for convenience reasons and to sit with other UM fans. Other than a few of the Rose bowl games, most games were not sold out and you could get better seats well below cost outside of the stadium before the game.  Given that this year's game probably won't even come close to selling out, I am thinking about scalping them right before the game.  Most likely you can get better seats (unused corporate sponsor tickets) for a much lower cost.  So your decision will probably come down to cost or convenience.