UW-Madison’s athletic board voted Friday to increase the price of student section football season tickets. The vote led to a discussion on the chronic lateness of students attending football games, an issue the program has tried unsuccessfully to address in the past.
While UW-Madison’s football program has had success on the field in recent years, players say the student section does not fill until just before “Jump Around” in the third quarter.
“We sell out our student tickets every year, but one of the biggest concerns we have, when we run out of the tunnel, you turn around and it's empty until the third quarter for most games,” Arrington Farrar, a Badgers inside linebacker and the board's student-athlete representative told Wisconsin State Journal. “They come and Jump Around and then leave."
One proposed solution is to incorporate student ticket fees into other student fees so that the student section fills up on a first come, first served basis.
However, students blame their tardiness on the length of security lines before entering games. But students do fill the stadium early for big games like Ohio State and night games, according to UW-Madison Athletic Director Barry Alvarez.
“I feel like it's the games that aren't the key matchup games that we've got to get people to,” Farrar said.
According to Alvarez his office is still working with ticket office to lure students to games for kick-off, but says students should not expect giveaways from the athletic department.
The ticket price hike, from $24 to $26, marks the first in six years.
