Game Week Thread 2024 Playoffs Round 1: Clemson at Texas

[Hookem10 848]

4 hours ago, D3zii said:

I mean I’m not surprised anyone is picking Clemson, I mean we haven’t been exactly playing like world beaters offensive or special teams wise. And Sark didn’t have his best day last time Texas took the field. 
 

at this point we just have to prove it and until other wise Sark hasn’t won a bowl or playoff game 

 

Can you imagine if we made our field goals against Georgia and won the game - would the narrative be different. Not really to us, but to the media maybe - just win 

[Codaxx 6,205]

 

[HenryJames 67,111]

[Pancho 46,031]

Sounds like we will be required to show a Clemson entrance video?

Ohio State says Tennessee will have an entrance video because the game environment is controlled by the CFP while the staffing is in control of the host institution. 

[BachelorTrek 3,262]

2 hours ago, Codaxx said:

 

These Morons have ignored Texas or bashed Texas when they bothered to mention them even last season, too. 

The few compliments they said were said very quickly and it must have hurt them so much to say because of their innate Texas-hatred.

As with so many other Texas-haters this year, it's not that Texas is great, it's that every single team that Texas beats is a great team/CFP-contender/etc. BEFORE Texas beats them, and then these same teams Texas beats suddenly become dogshit AFTER (and because) Texas beats them.

Then they say the only reason that "meh" Texas was able to beat them is because they sucked.  

clemPson is likewise being built-up as a world-beater team, and only after Texas dispatches them, they'll claim Texas is "no good," and clemPson imploded/gave-away-the-game/same-Mobilehoma-copium-horseshit.

I can picture the future headlines now: "'Meh' Texas wins CFP/MNC, but they didn't earn it/it was handed to them/they're still 'no-good'/blah-blah!"  Lulz.

[BachelorTrek 3,262]

15 minutes ago, Pancho said:

Sounds like we will be required to show a Clemson entrance video?

Ohio State says Tennessee will have an entrance video because the game environment is controlled by the CFP while the staffing is in control of the host institution. 

Disgusting when CFP home games get turned into NCAA Baseball Regional-style neutral shit.

[Red Five 41,587]

17 minutes ago, Pancho said:

Sounds like we will be required to show a Clemson entrance video?

This could potentially be really funny.

[Js1 86,906]

6 minutes ago, Red Five said:

This could potentially be really funny.

I assume we play whatever Clemson gives us.  Like someone said, will be hilarious to watch it get booed loudly

[South Austin 53,147]

1 minute ago, Js1 said:

I assume we play whatever Clemson gives us.  Like someone said, will be hilarious to watch it get booed loudly

NCAA playoff rules prohibit booing the other team.

[Tex Pete 21,388]

10 minutes ago, South Austin said:

NCAA playoff rules prohibit booing the other team.

Dont make me throw water bottles. 

[LonghornSean 4,072]

The Athletic had an article last month about some of the guidelines and logistics for home playoffs. Intro videos, no LED light shows allowed after TDs, etc.

 

Quote

How will College Football Playoff home games work? Tickets, traditions and other questions

Chris Vannini

Nov 1, 2024

IRVING, Texas — Construction is underway several floors up in a nondescript office building just off the highway. Tarps, tape, the works cover offices. On the other side of the elevator bank, behind a door with a big gold football logo, another kind of construction is nearing completion.

When the College Football Playoff and conference commissioners unveiled a 12-team expansion proposal in 2021, the size of the field was the headline change. But just as interesting to many fans was the new first round: four games played at the home stadiums of the teams seeded No. 5 through No. 8, instead of bowl sites. One game will take place Friday, Dec. 20, with three following in a tripleheader on Saturday Dec. 21.

The new format sparked a high level of excitement and an unprecedented undertaking. After decades of the sport’s postseason taking place almost exclusively off campus, college football’s top playoff will, for the first time, feel like actual college football.

“There was a feeling that the home game opportunity was healthy for fans, not having to travel,” said SEC commissioner Greg Sankey, part of the four-member subgroup that began exploring expansion in 2019.

College football games are massive events that reshape the economics of college towns on gameday more so than pro sports do for major cities. Schools and CFP staff have spent the past year and half putting together all the logistics, gaming out every conceivable detail, from visitors’ seating options to the best way to put the CFP patch on the jerseys. The process culminated in an 87-page manual the CFP released to schools in August, since obtained by The Athletic. But the work is still ongoing. The plans for ticket prices recently changed again.

“It’s been a daunting task,” said CFP chief operating officer Byron Hatch. “But we have a really good staff here. The big rocks, the big areas to run a football game, we’re covered.”

With the first set of in-season CFP rankings coming out on Tuesday, the years of planning will move closer to reality for the four schools eventually selected to host, and everyone agrees with what Sankey said in Nashville earlier this month: This has to go right.

“For some of these schools,” said CFP executive director Rich Clark, “it’s going to be the biggest game they’ve ever had on their campus.”

Will it feel like a home game?

For most of college football’s 100-plus-year history, the postseason has made little to no sense. Championships were long determined by polls. Bowl games began in the 1900s as local exhibitions for economic benefit. Over time, the bowl executives became power brokers that played a role in the national championship. Outside of Miami winning some national championships in its Orange Bowl home stadium and UCLA playing in the Rose Bowl stadium (neither of which are located on campus), the postseason was played at neutral sites. That continued with the BCS and the four-team College Football Playoff. The closest comparison to a true home game with the stakes of December’s first round might be Group of 5 conference championship games and lower-division playoffs.

Finally, for one round, the FBS postseason will have true home-field flair, and the CFP wanted to make sure the games felt like home games. All 134 stadiums were eligible. Although schools can choose a neutral site to host, Clark said Wednesday that every school in the mix this year plans to use its home field. Schools can hold their normal home game rituals, including run-out music, third-down crowd prompts and traditions between quarters. Clemson can run down the Hill. Oregon’s duck mascot can ride out on a motorcycle.

“A team earned the right to play at home, and along with that comes pageantry,” former CFP executive director Bill Hancock said. “College football is pageantry.”

The visiting team will also be allowed to use its traditional run-out with music and a video, if it would like, according to the manual. If the visiting team brings its band, it, too, will perform at halftime. Both bands would get six minutes and 30 seconds as part of the 22-minute halftime – a break two minutes longer than the regular season but normal for previous CFP games.

The field will be painted as normal, with a CFP logo somewhere on the field, and the CFP will provide goal post wraps. The CFP will control digital signage and in-game entertainment. If you hate the recent trend of stadiums flashing all their lights after touchdowns, some good news: That’s not allowed. Schools must cover up any lower-bowl advertising that might show up on TV and use CFP sponsors, but their field sponsorships can remain. The game officials are pre-assigned by the CFP.

Much of this is similar to when schools host an NCAA championship event in any other sport. The difference is that a round of the baseball or soccer tournaments, or even an FCS playoff game, doesn’t bring in more than 100,000 people and a full ESPN production like this could. The CFP has Zoom meetings scheduled with team operations officials on the Sunday the field is finalized (Dec. 8), and an online portal will go live in November with each school’s information.

“Baseball, you get awarded a Super Regional and turn around within a week, but it’s very different than 101,000 at DKR-Texas Memorial Stadium,” Texas executive senior associate AD Drew Martin said. “The scale is definitely different.”

Because the first-round games are not bowl games, there will be no postgame trophy presentation. Instead, there will be a recognition in the winning team’s locker room with representatives from the upcoming bowl quarterfinal.

How will tickets work?

First-round CFP hosts will handle seating similar to a normal home game, with some exceptions. Each conference has its own visiting ticket policies, from the number of tickets visitors are given to where those seats are located — only the SEC requires a block of seats in the lower bowl — so the CFP and the commissioners had to come up with a standardization.

The rules: Visiting teams will receive 3,500 tickets, with a maximum of 500 of those available to the band. The fans can be split up into no more than two blocks, with at least 1,500 in the lower bowl. The visiting team will decide where its band sits, but it must have access to the field.

Home teams will handle their ticket sales however they would like. Most expect to give first dibs to their season-ticket holders like they would any other postseason game and handle it like a typical home game. Prices were originally set to be equal to the highest-priced home game from the previous two years, but after questions about donations and seat licenses, the CFP has set a flat set of ticket prices for every site. Tickets will cost between $100 and $250 for general seating, not including clubs and suites. (The CFP will retain all ticket revenue and redistribute to the conferences.)

“We want it to be as similar to a normal home game as possible,” said CFP director of premium and ticket sales Michael Bos. “We’re trying to have them make as few changes as possible.”

Schools are still figuring out when they want to put the possible home game tickets on sale. Texas will open it up next week. Bos would like all of the schools to get moving, so there is a better idea of how it will look.

The big unknown remains students. Schools will be on winter break, and many will have completed winter graduation ceremonies. Notre Dame will keep its dorms open an extra 24 hours for students, if the Irish host. Student tickets will cost $25 and are not included in any season-long plan, per the CFP.

“The biggest question we’re getting is, what do we do if our students don’t show up?” Bos said. “Ohio State’s holding 29,000 student tickets, Texas A&M’s 39,000. Some schools are concerned, so we’re trying to figure out when to go on sale. Some schools are far away. We’re still talking a lot about that to see what everybody else is doing.”

The answer is that nobody really knows how this will go. The CFP and schools are hoping for the best and will adjust next year depending on what happens.

How are stadiums getting ready?

When Texas hosted Georgia on Oct. 19, more than 1,000 part-time staff were needed to put the event together, on top of normal staff and nonprofits. The scene outside Darrell K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium included food and drink vendors, team stores, large TV screens, a Ferris wheel and other carnival games and rides. During the game, it all had to be cleared out so streets would be open as fans left the game.

Every college football Saturday is a massive event, whether it’s a metropolitan area like Austin or a smaller town like Clemson, and game dates are set months or years in advance. A CFP first-round game will be set with two weeks’ notice, so schools have had to make sure they have everyone on call, from concession staff to nonprofit groups and more. (Unlike with tickets, schools will keep all concession and parking revenue.)

“It’s that temporary part-time staff that operates gates, ushers, concessions on short notice, that’s the one that causes me personally the most trepidation,” Martin said. “But we have great companies with infrastructure and have assured us we’re OK. Until we live through it, that’s a wild card.”

In those smaller college towns, game day hotels and rentals are big business because they’re scarce. Securing visiting team hotels was a top priority. Working with the agency Collegiate Sports Travel, the CFP sent out a Request for Proposal (RFP) to hotels in all 134 FBS towns in fall 2022 to see what was possible. Hatch and the CFP eventually signed hotel contracts in about 90 markets, with plans to whittle that number down as teams fell out of CFP contention. The first cut day is next Wednesday, and the CFP will cancel a majority of those hotel contracts. Sorry, Tallahassee.

Visiting teams are expected to handle travel like a normal road game, arriving in town the day before the game. But home schools were required to secure off-site practice fields in case the visiting team wants to practice, perhaps if they travel cross-country and arrive a day earlier.

There is nothing the CFP and schools can do about the weather but hope for the best. Penn State winterized Beaver Stadium for the purpose of winter events like the CFP, and other schools have prepared as best they can. Schools hosted December games during the pandemic-impacted 2020 season, but with limited fans in attendance.

“Playing a game in December in Provo could be really exciting and also snowy and really cold,” BYU athletic director Tom Holmoe said. “We usually shut the stadium down in November. You’ll have to keep it alive.”

Into the unknown

It’s inherently awkward for schools to talk about home CFP games in early November. The possibility of hosting implies they didn’t win their conference championship. There has been chatter among administrators over why the top four seeds in the CFP won’t get to play at home. The bye to the second round is the reward, and that won’t change. The new CFP deal, running from 2026 through 2031, keeps the bowls involved past the first round, whether or not the field expands beyond 12.

“We all like the tradition of the bowls, but moreso, the bowl committees know how to put on games and hospitality and game operations,” Hancock said. “They know how to do that better than anybody.”

For the CFP staffers, this is exciting and nerve-racking new territory. They’re not in full control. They trust schools’ ability to host games, but no one’s gone through something like this at this scale before, and the turnaround will be so quick. The NFL also scheduled two big matchups opposite the CFP on Saturday, a not-so-subtle shot across the bow.

Clark, the former Air Force lieutenant general and academy superintendent, is just four months into the job leading the CFP, but he spent months shadowing Hancock. On the eve of college football history, he compares this preparation to his military work in a simple way: land the plane.

“When you fly and there’s an emergency, you make sure you have the engines working, you have the gear down, and if you have that done, you can get the plane on the ground,” he said. “We’re getting the gear down. We still have engines cooking, and we’ll be able to do this.”

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/5889137/2024/11/01/college-football-playoff-home-game-tickets/

Edited Thursday at 08:18 PM by LonghornSean

[texifornia 58,748]

7 hours ago, Alien Octopus said:

We need to make a sacrifice to the football Gods so that any of those fucking strip tackle balls bounce our way.
Also, the linemen need to be thumped in the testicles every time they negate a play with a dumb fuck penalty. Where is the team leadership?
Auburn needs to kick 100 field goals a day. And Pole commander needs to close those thighs until the fucking special teams makes a return inside the other 30. 

Hitting Cam Williams in the nuts every time he false starts would just make him dumb AND sterile, which I don't think helps us very much.

[Drew 2,833]

8 hours ago, D3zii said:

I mean I’m not surprised anyone is picking Clemson, I mean we haven’t been exactly playing like world beaters offensive or special teams wise. And Sark didn’t have his best day last time Texas took the field. 
 

at this point we just have to prove it and until other wise Sark hasn’t won a bowl or playoff game 

 

True...but most of these people are saying things like "Clemson's defense is good and will pressure Texas, and the Clemson QB is going home and will show out!"

Without mentioning that Texas Defense is literally shutting down everyone they play not named Georgia with short field position.

[EZ$ 2,125]

1 hour ago, South Austin said:

NCAA playoff rules prohibit booing the other team.

Advantage aggy

[Hank_Hill 19,702]

9 hours ago, D3zii said:

I mean I’m not surprised anyone is picking Clemson, I mean we haven’t been exactly playing like world beaters offensive or special teams wise. And Sark didn’t have his best day last time Texas took the field. 
 

at this point we just have to prove it and until other wise Sark hasn’t won a bowl or playoff game 

 

What has Clemson proven?

[DanTheHorn 5,061]

2 hours ago, BachelorTrek said:

These Morons have ignored Texas or bashed Texas when they bothered to mention them even last season, too. 

The few compliments they said were said very quickly and it must have hurt them so much to say because of their innate Texas-hatred.

As with so many other Texas-haters this year, it's not that Texas is great, it's that every single team that Texas beats is a great team/CFP-contender/etc. BEFORE Texas beats them, and then these same teams Texas beats suddenly become dogshit AFTER (and because) Texas beats them.

Then they say the only reason that "meh" Texas was able to beat them is because they sucked.  

clemPson is likewise being built-up as a world-beater team, and only after Texas dispatches them, they'll claim Texas is "no good," and clemPson imploded/gave-away-the-game/same-Mobilehoma-copium-horseshit.

I can picture the future headlines now: "'Meh' Texas wins CFP/MNC, but they didn't earn it/it was handed to them/they're still 'no-good'/blah-blah!"  Lulz.

I watch these guys and you can always tell which one of them has a Michigan education. The other two are morons and they entertain me because they hate Texas was so good this year. All these guys and their type had a look of relief after the Georgia game. That is why I wanted that trophy so badly.

[HOOKEM4 5,151]

2 hours ago, South Austin said:

NCAA playoff rules prohibit booing the other team.

Also, this little tidbit almost went by unnoticed, the taco bell gong will be back and turned to 11.

[Herpa Derpa 6,304]

 

[BachelorTrek 3,262]

 

[Funk Doctor Spock 13,118]

On 12/11/2024 at 3:39 PM, Codaxx said:

https://www.si.com/college-football/ohio-politician-proposes-law-banning-flag-planting-ohio-state

better do it quick

That's a level of pettiness I cannot get behind. If kids want to plant a flag, IDGAF as long as it's not in DKR. 

[Funk Doctor Spock 13,118]

On 12/11/2024 at 4:10 PM, Js1 said:

Capes or no?

Would Batman not wear a cape? Then hell yeah with the capes!

[Funk Doctor Spock 13,118]

On 12/11/2024 at 4:22 PM, Tex Long said:

Capes, but no spats.

 

Nor ascots.

Nor spandex

[Born Burnt 6,222]

5 minutes ago, Funk Doctor Spock said:

Nor spandex

[Pig Bellmont 8,867]

3 hours ago, LonghornSean said:

The biggest question we’re getting is, what do we do if our students don’t show up?” Bos said. “Ohio State’s holding 29,000 student tickets, Texas A&M’s 39,000.

I don’t think Aggy needs to be worried about playoffs any time soon 

[GabrielsHorn 2,242]

6 hours ago, sidis said:

and arkansas. and ou. we have been excellent against running qbs all year when we knew it was coming.

 

 

it's not devil's advocate to point these things out. they are all true and they are things that need to be acknowledged and then discarded and completely irrelevant going forward.

my bigger chicken little thought is that we really need to go out and win this game emphatically because it is a big game at home. no one has really talked about it much but we need to exorcise some serious fucking demons when it comes to big time home games right now. pretty much every one with big time national hype leading up to it since the 2016 notre dame game has been shitty.

2024 big home games: georgia (loss).

2023: no big home games.

2022 big home games: bama (loss), tcu (loss).

2021: no big home games.

2020: not really but maybe, maybe isu (loss).

2019: lsu (loss).

2018: west virginia (loss). i suppose you could maybe argue the usc game in 18 had a bit of hype but we had opened the season with a loss to fucking maryland so. it did jumpstart the one semi decent year we had in the 2010s.

2017: no big games but herman's big premier was a fucking loss to shitass maryland in the home opener.

throw that on top of the fact that sark has had absolutely no postseason success at texas to date, anyone that just assumes that texas rolls this game against a 10 win conference champion that has been in the playoff seven times is silly.

but we should win.

Missing KSU in 2019 and 2023 which may have been the last major win at home. Hasn’t been pretty. 

[BachelorTrek 3,262]

Just now, Funk Doctor Spock said:

That's a level of pettiness I cannot get behind. If kids want to plant a flag, IDGAF as long as it's not in DKR. 

You may not remember this, but aggy did something like that already, at DKR, in front of everyone pre-game one year.

They hid white spray-paint cans in their little corps-turds larp-stormtrooper costumes, and spray-painted some sort of junk on the Texas logo at the 50-yard line while hidden behind a wall of corps-turds so no one could see it unless there was a skycam at the game (there wasn't).

When they walked away, you saw the result, and the Texas athletic department managers ran out there after a couple minutes with spray-cans of burnt orange paint to cover over what the corps-turds had done.

IIRC, that was the last time aggy was allowed to do any pregame performance at DKR.

 

That might have been the same year that aggy and Texas ended their agreement to let each other's cannons travel to both stadiums to be fired, but if it wasn't the same year, it was around the same time that sportsmanship also stopped.

 

Speaking of petty, I knew one of their aggy band members (a dozen or so) that walked off the field during halftime for some commemoration performance (where both bands played together) that refused to perform on the same field with the Longhorn Band at DKR.

Their band director was furious, kicked them all out of the aggy band on the spot, and told them to find their own ways home. 

The next day he told me he joined the little aggy stormtrooper corps (separate from the aggy band) because the corps leader hated the aggy band director and wanted to piss him off some more.  Lulz.

[Huckleberry 34,403]

5 minutes ago, GabrielsHorn said:

Missing KSU in 2019 and 2023 which may have been the last major win at home. Hasn’t been pretty. 

Yeah, that one game major game at home losing streak has just been crazy.

[miguelito 11,440]

3 hours ago, Pancho said:

Sounds like we will be required to show a Clemson entrance video?

Ohio State says Tennessee will have an entrance video because the game environment is controlled by the CFP while the staffing is in control of the host institution. 

Hear me out:

Bring back the minotaurs, but add tiger heads to them a la Lee Corso.

[GabrielsHorn 2,242]

2 minutes ago, Huckleberry said:

Yeah, that one game major game at home losing streak has just been crazy.

Think it is somewhat in question whether an 8-4 KSU team counts as a major game. It was major as it led to our conference championship, but not exactly the cream of the crop team.

[MirrOlure 15,181]

The Athletic had an article last month about some of the guidelines and logistics for home playoffs. Intro videos, no LED light shows allowed after TDs, etc.
 

How will College Football Playoff home games work? Tickets, traditions and other questions

Chris Vannini

Nov 1, 2024

IRVING, Texas — Construction is underway several floors up in a nondescript office building just off the highway. Tarps, tape, the works cover offices. On the other side of the elevator bank, behind a door with a big gold football logo, another kind of construction is nearing completion.

When the College Football Playoff and conference commissioners unveiled a 12-team expansion proposal in 2021, the size of the field was the headline change. But just as interesting to many fans was the new first round: four games played at the home stadiums of the teams seeded No. 5 through No. 8, instead of bowl sites. One game will take place Friday, Dec. 20, with three following in a tripleheader on Saturday Dec. 21.

The new format sparked a high level of excitement and an unprecedented undertaking. After decades of the sport’s postseason taking place almost exclusively off campus, college football’s top playoff will, for the first time, feel like actual college football.

“There was a feeling that the home game opportunity was healthy for fans, not having to travel,” said SEC commissioner Greg Sankey, part of the four-member subgroup that began exploring expansion in 2019.

College football games are massive events that reshape the economics of college towns on gameday more so than pro sports do for major cities. Schools and CFP staff have spent the past year and half putting together all the logistics, gaming out every conceivable detail, from visitors’ seating options to the best way to put the CFP patch on the jerseys. The process culminated in an 87-page manual the CFP released to schools in August, since obtained by The Athletic. But the work is still ongoing. The plans for ticket prices recently changed again.

“It’s been a daunting task,” said CFP chief operating officer Byron Hatch. “But we have a really good staff here. The big rocks, the big areas to run a football game, we’re covered.”

With the first set of in-season CFP rankings coming out on Tuesday, the years of planning will move closer to reality for the four schools eventually selected to host, and everyone agrees with what Sankey said in Nashville earlier this month: This has to go right.

“For some of these schools,” said CFP executive director Rich Clark, “it’s going to be the biggest game they’ve ever had on their campus.”

Will it feel like a home game?

For most of college football’s 100-plus-year history, the postseason has made little to no sense. Championships were long determined by polls. Bowl games began in the 1900s as local exhibitions for economic benefit. Over time, the bowl executives became power brokers that played a role in the national championship. Outside of Miami winning some national championships in its Orange Bowl home stadium and UCLA playing in the Rose Bowl stadium (neither of which are located on campus), the postseason was played at neutral sites. That continued with the BCS and the four-team College Football Playoff. The closest comparison to a true home game with the stakes of December’s first round might be Group of 5 conference championship games and lower-division playoffs.

Finally, for one round, the FBS postseason will have true home-field flair, and the CFP wanted to make sure the games felt like home games. All 134 stadiums were eligible. Although schools can choose a neutral site to host, Clark said Wednesday that every school in the mix this year plans to use its home field. Schools can hold their normal home game rituals, including run-out music, third-down crowd prompts and traditions between quarters. Clemson can run down the Hill. Oregon’s duck mascot can ride out on a motorcycle.

“A team earned the right to play at home, and along with that comes pageantry,” former CFP executive director Bill Hancock said. “College football is pageantry.”

The visiting team will also be allowed to use its traditional run-out with music and a video, if it would like, according to the manual. If the visiting team brings its band, it, too, will perform at halftime. Both bands would get six minutes and 30 seconds as part of the 22-minute halftime – a break two minutes longer than the regular season but normal for previous CFP games.

The field will be painted as normal, with a CFP logo somewhere on the field, and the CFP will provide goal post wraps. The CFP will control digital signage and in-game entertainment. If you hate the recent trend of stadiums flashing all their lights after touchdowns, some good news: That’s not allowed. Schools must cover up any lower-bowl advertising that might show up on TV and use CFP sponsors, but their field sponsorships can remain. The game officials are pre-assigned by the CFP.

Much of this is similar to when schools host an NCAA championship event in any other sport. The difference is that a round of the baseball or soccer tournaments, or even an FCS playoff game, doesn’t bring in more than 100,000 people and a full ESPN production like this could. The CFP has Zoom meetings scheduled with team operations officials on the Sunday the field is finalized (Dec. 8), and an online portal will go live in November with each school’s information.

“Baseball, you get awarded a Super Regional and turn around within a week, but it’s very different than 101,000 at DKR-Texas Memorial Stadium,” Texas executive senior associate AD Drew Martin said. “The scale is definitely different.”

Because the first-round games are not bowl games, there will be no postgame trophy presentation. Instead, there will be a recognition in the winning team’s locker room with representatives from the upcoming bowl quarterfinal.

How will tickets work?

First-round CFP hosts will handle seating similar to a normal home game, with some exceptions. Each conference has its own visiting ticket policies, from the number of tickets visitors are given to where those seats are located — only the SEC requires a block of seats in the lower bowl — so the CFP and the commissioners had to come up with a standardization.

The rules: Visiting teams will receive 3,500 tickets, with a maximum of 500 of those available to the band. The fans can be split up into no more than two blocks, with at least 1,500 in the lower bowl. The visiting team will decide where its band sits, but it must have access to the field.

Home teams will handle their ticket sales however they would like. Most expect to give first dibs to their season-ticket holders like they would any other postseason game and handle it like a typical home game. Prices were originally set to be equal to the highest-priced home game from the previous two years, but after questions about donations and seat licenses, the CFP has set a flat set of ticket prices for every site. Tickets will cost between $100 and $250 for general seating, not including clubs and suites. (The CFP will retain all ticket revenue and redistribute to the conferences.)

“We want it to be as similar to a normal home game as possible,” said CFP director of premium and ticket sales Michael Bos. “We’re trying to have them make as few changes as possible.”

Schools are still figuring out when they want to put the possible home game tickets on sale. Texas will open it up next week. Bos would like all of the schools to get moving, so there is a better idea of how it will look.

The big unknown remains students. Schools will be on winter break, and many will have completed winter graduation ceremonies. Notre Dame will keep its dorms open an extra 24 hours for students, if the Irish host. Student tickets will cost $25 and are not included in any season-long plan, per the CFP.

“The biggest question we’re getting is, what do we do if our students don’t show up?” Bos said. “Ohio State’s holding 29,000 student tickets, Texas A&M’s 39,000. Some schools are concerned, so we’re trying to figure out when to go on sale. Some schools are far away. We’re still talking a lot about that to see what everybody else is doing.”

The answer is that nobody really knows how this will go. The CFP and schools are hoping for the best and will adjust next year depending on what happens.

How are stadiums getting ready?

When Texas hosted Georgia on Oct. 19, more than 1,000 part-time staff were needed to put the event together, on top of normal staff and nonprofits. The scene outside Darrell K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium included food and drink vendors, team stores, large TV screens, a Ferris wheel and other carnival games and rides. During the game, it all had to be cleared out so streets would be open as fans left the game.

Every college football Saturday is a massive event, whether it’s a metropolitan area like Austin or a smaller town like Clemson, and game dates are set months or years in advance. A CFP first-round game will be set with two weeks’ notice, so schools have had to make sure they have everyone on call, from concession staff to nonprofit groups and more. (Unlike with tickets, schools will keep all concession and parking revenue.)

“It’s that temporary part-time staff that operates gates, ushers, concessions on short notice, that’s the one that causes me personally the most trepidation,” Martin said. “But we have great companies with infrastructure and have assured us we’re OK. Until we live through it, that’s a wild card.”

In those smaller college towns, game day hotels and rentals are big business because they’re scarce. Securing visiting team hotels was a top priority. Working with the agency Collegiate Sports Travel, the CFP sent out a Request for Proposal (RFP) to hotels in all 134 FBS towns in fall 2022 to see what was possible. Hatch and the CFP eventually signed hotel contracts in about 90 markets, with plans to whittle that number down as teams fell out of CFP contention. The first cut day is next Wednesday, and the CFP will cancel a majority of those hotel contracts. Sorry, Tallahassee.

Visiting teams are expected to handle travel like a normal road game, arriving in town the day before the game. But home schools were required to secure off-site practice fields in case the visiting team wants to practice, perhaps if they travel cross-country and arrive a day earlier.

There is nothing the CFP and schools can do about the weather but hope for the best. Penn State winterized Beaver Stadium for the purpose of winter events like the CFP, and other schools have prepared as best they can. Schools hosted December games during the pandemic-impacted 2020 season, but with limited fans in attendance.

“Playing a game in December in Provo could be really exciting and also snowy and really cold,” BYU athletic director Tom Holmoe said. “We usually shut the stadium down in November. You’ll have to keep it alive.”

Into the unknown

It’s inherently awkward for schools to talk about home CFP games in early November. The possibility of hosting implies they didn’t win their conference championship. There has been chatter among administrators over why the top four seeds in the CFP won’t get to play at home. The bye to the second round is the reward, and that won’t change. The new CFP deal, running from 2026 through 2031, keeps the bowls involved past the first round, whether or not the field expands beyond 12.

“We all like the tradition of the bowls, but moreso, the bowl committees know how to put on games and hospitality and game operations,” Hancock said. “They know how to do that better than anybody.”

For the CFP staffers, this is exciting and nerve-racking new territory. They’re not in full control. They trust schools’ ability to host games, but no one’s gone through something like this at this scale before, and the turnaround will be so quick. The NFL also scheduled two big matchups opposite the CFP on Saturday, a not-so-subtle shot across the bow.

Clark, the former Air Force lieutenant general and academy superintendent, is just four months into the job leading the CFP, but he spent months shadowing Hancock. On the eve of college football history, he compares this preparation to his military work in a simple way: land the plane.

“When you fly and there’s an emergency, you make sure you have the engines working, you have the gear down, and if you have that done, you can get the plane on the ground,” he said. “We’re getting the gear down. We still have engines cooking, and we’ll be able to do this.”

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/5889137/2024/11/01/college-football-playoff-home-game-tickets/

That’s a lot of words and none of them are “beer”

[Funk Doctor Spock 13,118]

4 hours ago, LonghornSean said:

The Athletic had an article last month about some of the guidelines and logistics for home playoffs. Intro videos, no LED light shows allowed after TDs, etc.

 

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/5889137/2024/11/01/college-football-playoff-home-game-tickets/

So no fun. Got it. 

[Funk Doctor Spock 13,118]

2 hours ago, Born Burnt said:

I'm saving those for the game. I'll either be tripping hard enough to hear us score, or my trip may send me over the edge if Clemson manages to upset us. I might even fight that little turd kid who lives across the street in my underwear. I just hope I don't get banned from being near any schools for the rest of my life. 

[Dahobbs 18,180]

11 minutes ago, Funk Doctor Spock said:

I'm saving those for the game. I'll either be tripping hard enough to hear us score, or my trip may send me over the edge if Clemson manages to upset us. I might even fight that little turd kid who lives across the street in my underwear. I just hope I don't get banned from being near any schools for the rest of my life. 

Why is he living in your underwear?

[sidis 9,990]

1 hour ago, GabrielsHorn said:

Missing KSU in 2019 and 2023 which may have been the last major win at home. Hasn’t been pretty. 

I mean…I guess?

actually, no. I’m going to say no. We were 5-3 going into the 2019 game with two shitty conference losses already and kstate had two losses going into the game with us last year. They were exciting games that we won but at the end of the day, I deny your petition to characterize either of those as “big games.”

Either way, time to get some home field juice back. 

[jetsfan76 762]

SIAP, but Sam Acho has Clempson beating us in his bracket.

[AeroHorn 793]

Since the home team doesn’t keep any ticket revenue, what’s stopping the home teams from pricing the tickets at the minimum allowed value ($100)?

[thunderlounge 8,310]

37 minutes ago, Funk Doctor Spock said:

So no fun. Got it. 

 

 

[Funk Doctor Spock 13,118]

1 hour ago, Dahobbs said:

Why is he living in your underwear?

Look, on shrroms, I have elves living in my underwear. I've spoken to my framed autographed Wu-tang poster. Anything goes at this point. 

[CurlyDumps 4,617]

1 hour ago, jetsfan76 said:

SIAP, but Sam Acho has Clempson beating us in his bracket.

Classic bracketology mistake. Try to predict the 12/5 upset, you'll end up getting them all wrong.

[TreatyOak 17,189]

If we lose, do you think we have a shot to pass Aggy's Notre Dame game for Best Loss?

 

[NBHorn7 247]

13 minutes ago, CurlyDumps said:

Classic bracketology mistake. Try to predict the 12/5 upset, you'll end up getting them all wrong.

It's no mistake he has Clemson beating Georgia in the title game.

[ztejas 44,114]

11 hours ago, Js1 said:

Sounds very similar to volleyball/WBB/baseball/softball

Yes it’s a “home game” but there’s some neutrality to it 

 

That's actually very cool. Good way to reward the teams that made the dance. 

[ShaggyBevo RIP 3,873]

This could potentially be really funny.

TEXAS!


FIGHT!


Chant drowning it out would be good as then it is the fans and not the University.

[Funk Doctor Spock 13,118]

It's pretty baffling that Sam Acho graduated with honors from UT, and yet he's retarded. 

[BachelorTrek 3,262]

Just now, Funk Doctor Spock said:

It's pretty baffling that Sam Acho graduated with honors from UT, and yet he's retarded regarded. 

FIFY

[Funk Doctor Spock 13,118]

Just now, BachelorTrek said:

FIFY

True. My bad. 

[89Horn 1,735]

8 hours ago, Pancho said:

Sounds like we will be required to show a Clemson entrance video?

Ohio State says Tennessee will have an entrance video because the game environment is controlled by the CFP while the staffing is in control of the host institution. 

Ok.  Well if that’s the case, then instead of our typical tunnel entrance, I say put in a grass ramp from the second level balcony just above the “Campbell-Williams Field” sign and put the mounted horns at the top for all the players see and tap as they run down the ramp.  I think that would be special, you know, if mandated to allow Clemson an entrance video.

[Roofle 310]

Game ops being run by CFP instead of home teams is so incredibly stupid. It's a home game. Play it like a home game. Want an intro video? Then don't suck ass and get a better seed.

[Coelenterate Fuccboi 13,385]

For the love of Texas football, I hope the team isn’t looking as far past Clemson as many of our fans.

[westexhorn 2,157]

4 hours ago, Coelenterate Fuccboi said:

For the love of Texas football, I hope the team isn’t looking as far past Clemson as many of our fans.

I hope people realize that Clemson is not going to be cake walk, especially not with our offense and special team struggles lately.