Humanitarian Bowl Ticket Sales In The Dozens

[smupony94]

BOISE - The match up is different every year but to Humanitarian Bowl organizers one thing remains the same: making money.

So what can Boise expect with this year's H-bowl game?

This year the Boise State Broncos are headed to sunny San Diego, leaving the Humanitarian Bowl orange-less again. But BSU ticket agents say don't let the lack of lines fool you. They say their phones have been ringing off the hook, not only for Poinsettia Bowl seats, but also for the H-Bowl match up.

"Now that we know its Nevada and Maryland people are excited about that match up," said Anita Guerricabeitia, assistant director for ticket sales.

Humanitarian Bowl officials admit they wanted BSU to stay and play on the blue turf.

"Of course it's a big boost to us on the revenue side when we have Boise State because we basically sell every seat in the stadium," said Kevin McDonald, Executive Director for the Roady's Humanitarian Bowl.

Last year 26,000 people braved the December cold to watch the game. While some fans made the trek to Boise McDonald says they rely on locals to help fill the seats.

"The success of this bowl is really based on travel not coming from the ACC, we like the fact we get a marque name coming from the ACC."

"It has a real positive impact whether it's locals or whether it's out of town folks," said Bobbie Patterson, Executive Director for the Boise Convention and Visitors Bureau.

Patterson says on average a visitor spends about $240 a day when they come to the city. With the H-Bowl a week after the Poinsettia Bowl this year the hope is those BSU fans who made the trip to California will be back to help out come December 30th.

"It generates enthusiastic spending," said Patterson.

As of Monday afternoon the University of Maryland says it's sold about 16 tickets to the game. The University of Nevada says it's sold 8 so far

[Higher Authority]

We all know the economy is squeezing a lot of people, and getting to Boise probably is just about as easy as getting to Iceland, or maybe Mars, but it's a shame if this game doesn't draw well. Both teams are fairly exciting to watch, and both play a really entertaining brand of football. I'm looking forward to watching the game on TV.

[Stallion]

anticompetitive monopolistic conduct leads to illogical, economically inefficient results. In a free market Maryland would never be invited to this bowl. Not such a surprise.

[CalallenStang]

http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/sports/ ... sales.html

Humanitarian Bowl ticket sales
It's made its way onto the vast expanse of the Web that Maryland has sold all of 16 tickets to the Humanitarian Bowl and Nevada has sold eight.

Maryland says those numbers are inaccurate.

"As for that quote, we can't find the source of it," says Brian Ullmann, Maryland's senior associate athletics director. "It certainly is not accurate and it certainly did not come from us. Nor is the Nevada number correct."

It's true that Maryland isn't expecting big ticket sales. The cost of getting to Boise and the economy aren't helping.

Maryland isn't ready to release any numbers, and I've got inquiries into the bowl folks in Boise to get their figures. I've been told by others in Boise that a crowd of 25,000 would be expected -- largely composed of locals. My best estimate is that Maryland will have a contingent in the hundreds.

[huskerpony]

Sure. Blame the economy.

It could also be that Maryland's fan base is AWFUL. I used to live in Baltimore (a couple of years ago when Maryland was even ranked) and I had to watch all of the Big 12 games with no sound because there would be a whole 3 people in the bar to watch the Maryland game. If people won't even go to the bar to watch the game on tv, why would they want to travel to Boise in December???

They don't have any problem turning people out for Raven's games. Just not many college football fans out there.

On the other hand.....it was really nice for me because they were so desperate to get people into the bars on Saturday afternoons that they had $1.50 beers all day!