Advertisement

'Unprecedented demand' for UGA playoff tickets vs. Ohio State sends cutoff score sky-high

marc weiszer, athens banner-herald
·4 min read
70
Georgia fans root on their team during the first half of the Chick-fil-A Kickoff NCAA college football game between Oregon and Georgia in Atlanta, on Saturday, Sept. 3, 2022.
Georgia fans root on their team during the first half of the Chick-fil-A Kickoff NCAA college football game between Oregon and Georgia in Atlanta, on Saturday, Sept. 3, 2022.

Georgia’s third College Football Playoff semifinal game in program history is on home soil in Atlanta and quite a tough ticket for Bulldog fans.

To get your hands on tickets from the 13,000-seat allotment required donors who had dug deep in contributions and racked up priority points to The Georgia Bulldog Club.

The number has risen each playoff trip from 34,400 cumulative priority points in 2017 for the Rose Bowl, to 60,100 in 2021 to the Orange Bowl to 92,775 this year for the Peach Bowl against Ohio State to order reserved (non-club level) tickets.

“It’s a combination of a few factors,” athletic director Josh Brooks said Wednesday after a Peach Bowl press conference in Athens for the Dec. 31 matchup. “Any time you have a playoff game, obviously demand is up. The game being in your home state, the demand is up. … Travel is easier, the interest is higher. And then, look, the last three or four years, we’ve had a ton of support. That’s helped us build facilities and with that, the points get higher.”

More:UGA's Stetson Bennett, Ohio State's C.J. Stroud flip attention to coming CFP semifinal

The 13,000 ticket allotment is the same as Georgia received for each of its previous three CFP semifinal games. Georgia was allotted 16,000 tickets for the SEC championship game against LSU.

Georgia posted on its athletic website last week that its allotment goes to not only donors, but UGA faculty and staff, students and other institutional needs which includes groups like the Redcoat Band. For the Orange and Rose Bowls, 9,000 of the 13,000 tickets went to donors.

“With this year's CFP semifinal matchup taking place in our University's home state capital city, UGA experienced unprecedented demand for tickets, which yielded higher point cutoffs,” UGA athletics said last week.

Priority points are based on donations. Annual giving get a point per each $1. Magill Society members who donate between $25,000-$99,999 get one and a half points for each $1 and $100,000 or more get two points for each $1.

Ohio State sold its 13,000 ticket allotment by Wednesday last week, Peach Bowl CEO and president Gary Stokan said in Columbus on Tuesday. Stokan said in Athens Wednesday that Georgia sold out its tickets in one day.

“I know (Brooks) needs probably about 15,000 more like I do,” Stokan said.

More:Kirby Smart on Mike Leach's impact. His connection to UGA's Todd Monken & Stetson Bennett

The Peach Bowl is adding 2,000 standing room only seats and could break the Mercedes-Benz record crowd from the College Football Playoff national semifinal game in the 2019 season between LSU and Oklahoma of 78,347.

Georgia pre-sold its tickets. Given all 43,000 of its tickets for the Oregon game in Mercedes-Benz Stadium to open the season were scooped up, demand was there for tens of thousands more.

“I got a call from Josh before the SEC Championship game, hey, can you help me? I'm going to need some more tickets,” Stokan said. “It's a great problem to have, but it's a problem. I wish we had more tickets. I've had to tell a lot of people I don't have any tickets, which is tough.”

So where do all of the other tickets go beyond the 26,000 that the schools receive?

Stokan said that goes to sponsors, comped tickets, trade-outs and Mercedes-Benz personal seat license holders.

“And we were sold out in July before we even knew who the two teams were,” he said. “I think a lot of people in our renewal base, they'll buy the tickets waiting to see who the teams are. If they like the teams, they'll use the tickets. If they have a friend who's an alumnus of one of those schools or a business associate, they give the tickets to them. Or as we've learned, all of us who buy tickets, the secondary market becomes the primary market.”

Tickets started at $345 each on Wednesday on Stubhub for standing room only tickets.

Tickets started at $428 in the 300 levels, $630 in the 200 levels and $562 in the 100 level. Club seats in the 100-level started at $1,062 and $1,360 in the 200 level.

Georgia plans to send its Peach Bowl tickets via mobile delivery on Monday.

This article originally appeared on Athens Banner-Herald: Georgia football tickets for Peach Bowl vs. Ohio State in high demand