The Tribune has a story on football season ticketholders cancelling their tickets in the wake of the Fitzgerald firing and hazing scandal.
As to the timing of refunds, one ticketholder says the ticket office said: “be patient, because a lot of people are canceling tickets.”
We aren’t cancelling, but we thought about not renewing for 2024 for multiple reasons.
As I’ve said previously the schedule is unappealing so even the scalpers don’t have product to sell to the opposition.
Marc, did you mean 2023 or 2024? I only see 11 games on the 2024 schedule so far, it looks like a 3rd non-conference game is still TBA, which means it probably won’t be a great opponent.
Looking at the Hail to Purple site, they show games against UCLA in 2033 and 2034, presumably those separate contracts will be cancelled and folded into the conference schedule.
A friend of mine has tickets that have been in the family for 70 years. He was upset earlier that season ticket holders were being required to pay a seat license fee for seats at the new stadium. He is hoping for a cancellation or at least a delay now of the stadium Maybe NU will need to raise prices to help pay the legal settlements /judgements going forward ! Then again it’s hard to raise prices when demand is dropping
Harry
This year(2023) home schedule is very unappealing with no “high demand” opponents at home. The crowds will be D-E-A-D. We went to the game at Rutgers and it was their homecoming. We finally understood how difficult it is to play in silence and why opponents often have trouble in Evanston.
We were thinking about not renewing for 2024 due to playing at Soldier Field and the future PSLs.
We will be in the stands in 2023 unless they cancel the season. My optimistic appraisal has dropped from 5 wins to 1 win, or 2 if we’re lucky.
So far I’ve only seen one incoming freshman who has bailed on the Cats by entering the transfer portal, but no upperclassmen.
Any players entering the transfer portal might still wind up in Evanston next month. It’s a tough time of year for a player to find another school, most schools have their roster pretty much set for the fall if not necessarily their depth chart.
Cancelling the 2023 season seems a bit unlikely now, NU is gonna need the cash and I’m sure the Big Ten would withhold a large part of the $70 or so million they’d otherwise get if the Cats cancel out on the 2023 FB season, and that’s a much bigger number than what they get from ticket sales.
It isn’t officially dead, but I think the stadium project is on life support. Even assuming the Ryan family is still on board, it will be tough to raise the rest of the cash with the hazing scandal in the media every day.
I would not be surprised if NU decides to postpone the project for two years, even though that will probably increase costs by 20%. I wonder if they can get the OK from the city but defer the starting date?
I honestly don’t know where to project the 2023 season, I could see it being a total disaster or I could see the team banding together and winning more games than anyone reasonably expects them to. The former sounds more likely than the latter, though.
I think the over/under line is still 3.5 wins.
I think it really depends on how well David Braun does in pulling the team together. If there is a collapse in morale as there was after the Rashidi Wheeler death, things could really bottom out. Obviously there are probably guys on the team who participated in some of the alleged acts. How do they move forward? Can they turn and rebuild a new culture?
If Braun can inspire the team to stick together and seek to rebuild, they may surprise some teams. I think we have enough solid players returning, and some transfers to win a few games. Perhaps 4, at the outside even 6. The D must return to some semblance of competency, and O must learn to get into the end zone. I am very, very guardedly optimistic (trying to be) in the midst of real grief over all that is happening. I hope Braun is up to the task…
KM