… here’s Exhibit “A”.
As long as the consumer demand is there, they’ll bend the rules for the Irish. Haven’t I taught you anything about how money talks college football’s language?
If you want to know why your “how does Notre Dame get away with” complaints are ignored…
Filed under It's Just Bidness, Notre Dame's Faint Echoes
Get The Picture 
Eh, I’d be interested to see similar graphs for games that are not traditionally on the schedule. If Ohio State or Michigan or Oregon or someone like that came to Athens I imagine the result would be the same.
I’m not saying they don’t pull eyeballs – bc they do. I just think when you have the luxury of not playing people year in an year out the novelty is upped.
LikeLike
There’s too much here to draw baseline conclusions. Look at Clemson. I’d say that they are there because they are only 1 of 3 solid teams in their conference so throughout a season all their conference opponents will have a higher draw simply because they are there. Artificial padding of stats in my opinion.
LikeLike
I believe that is why no SEC school shows up until the sixth spot. Most of our tickets are expensive because there a lot more big games in conference, whereas ND is by far the biggest game for most of its opponents, hence the huge % increase. Not so for, say Bama. While Bama is the biggest opponent for everyone they play, its not by a wide margin, or could even be even with other big games for those teams. For example, Bama was our biggest game last year but was it bigger than Florida or Auburn? No. It was equal or close to it.
I’d like to see average ticket price when these teams are visiting compared. I’m positive it would be a closer comparison, with a big shakeup of the list.
LikeLike
Gag a maggot.
LikeLike
Irish are biggest draw in CFB. Reason is that people either love em or hate em. Ohio State, Michigan, USC, Texas, Oklahoma etc would be big too, but no one has a national following like ND. I am a rarity in the South..I like em, but like em even more when the Dawgs whup em.
LikeLike
How is Penn State #4? How far did this research back? 1990?
LikeLike
I attended the UVa-ND game last year, and the sheer buzz going into that game far eclipsed any UVa game I’ve ever attended. UVa home games by their very nature are rather dull and have a sleepy, bucolic feel…but not on that day. You would have thought UVA was 10-1 going into that game with an ACC champ on the line, instead of the hapless program that they are and especially then under the disastrous Mike London regime.
LikeLike
Whether you like them or not, the Irish draw on the pageantry and history of college football, and as you know, they’ve been monetizing that at the risk of killing the golden goose.
LikeLike
ND is playing 3 neutral site games this year where the other team is the “home” team. I’m not seeing a big effect once I control for that.
I know nosebleeds for UGA-UNC are $85.
That said, there aren’t many teams with the national following and tradition of Notre Dame, so good on em.
LikeLike
Plus, when your rivals are trying to milk you (hi Auburn! hi Tech!), that happens, too.
LikeLike
Great…guessing this means I won’t be making the ticket cutoff when UGA plays in South Bend just like I missed the cutoff for Ole Miss this time around. I am more excited to see the Dogs play in South Bend than I am for when ND comes to Athens on the return trip.
LikeLike
Don’t worry about tickets for ND. Just go, get some on the street. I got tickets the day of for ND-USC. Pretty sure they’ll be domers passing on Georgia.
LikeLike
On a relative basis, I feel the biggest increase with playing ND is the number of eyes on the TV set, not the price of admission you can command. Other top teams would have a very similar effect. I love that we have scheduled them but a home game against several, traditionally, top programs would be similar. You would pay the same, or more, for Texas, OU, FSU, ohio, USC, etc. and very close for the top SEC schools like Bama, LSU, etc. that we see occasionally.
LikeLike
So, according to the chart when Notre Dame visits Notre Dame the price of a Notre Dame football ticket increases 96% because of the Notre Dame effect?
LikeLike
Never understood the ND hate…looking forward to our series with them.
LikeLike
Couple things. They’re as obnoxious as Bama fans when they’re on top. Moreover, they used to be good AND catholic so most people didn’t like them because most people didn’t like catholics. Now people don’t dislike catholics, but the hatred for Notre Dame remains. Side note, the whole Spotlight thing has surely helped with that.
It could also be a reaction to the guilt we all feel for loving Rudy.
LikeLike
And if you say you don’t love Rudy, you’re just lying because you want the world to know how much you hate Notre Dame.
LikeLike
At least Catholics drink in front of one another 🙂
LikeLike
but little else.
LikeLike
“Notre Dame has drawn the ire of many a football fan over the years, but 1966 was one of the best examples of Notre Dame-ism that there ever was.
Notre Dame started the season in the top 10, and Alabama started the season as the top dog. Neither Alabama nor Notre Dame played in the first week and only Alabama made a bowl appearance (and victory).
Alabama absolutely destroyed the sixth-ranked Nebraska Cornhuskers 34-7. At the end of the year, the Michigan State Spartans and Notre Dame Fighting Irish sat atop the final AP Poll, while Alabama sat at the third position.
The final poll looked like this:
1) Notre Dame (9-0-1) (no bowl game)
2) Michigan State (9-0-1) (no bowl game)
3) Alabama (10-0) (Sugar Bowl demolition of powerhouse Nebraska)
So, when 1966 came to a close, a 9-0-1 Irish squad had Notre Dame’d its way to a national championship over an 11-0 Crimson Tide.
Cue the hatred seething from the South.”
LikeLike
That makes me like Notre Dame, not hate them. Screw Bama.
LikeLike
And I’d be willing to bet that Bama still counts this among their 16 claimed national championships (or however many they like to throw out there).
LikeLike
Going to tech definitely helps our numbers.
LikeLike
Look at who they’re playing on the road: ACC teams, most of which have lukewarm fan bases, Stanford, and USC. No shit, Alabama isn’t going to drive up ticket prices in the SEC in the same way because SEC teams play better home schedule and have more demand for their other games.
LikeLike
Anyone state an actual significant win for ND in the last 25 years? USC at home a few years ago seems tops since maybe the 80s. Remember that most of ND’s years of success where they personally set the schedule for their 10 games during the season, and then sat home all of December & January rather than playing anyone in the bowls at all. That didn’t change until the 70s. Not saying all their accomplishments are bogus but they, and the Big 10’s (Big 2, Little 8), accomplishments are more hype than substance as they specifically avoided the South and Southwest teams for many decades. We can only go off the history since bowl’s had some flexibility to pair better matchups, not when teams could pick and choose, or just sit home and crow.
LikeLike
Wonder what it would look like controlling for opponent average ticket price. Guessing some of these down-south schools are adding points on top of bigger baseline values.
LikeLike