Gopher Fans in Attendance

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Nomellini

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At road games I look for the camera to pan the Gopher contingent and note their level of enthusiasm. Last night I didn't notice any attempt to sweep through the faithful, just a a still shot of some older fans who were noticeably lacking in animation. A poster on another thread, I believe, referred to these folks as attendees at a mortician's convention. Just wondering about the overall level of enthusiasm in our crowd and opinions on the general atmosphere and experience. Thank you.
 

The official reported attendance is 21,220 fans.

This includes the half-deads. Some of these are the very same folks who would yell at you to go sit down at a Gopher football game.

Omicron, the lateness of the start time, and the venue may have dissuaded many from attending.

The size of the crowd is half the 2019 Outback Bowl at 40,518. That is why it sounded half-dead because it was.
 
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I sat behind the Gopher sideline and got a good view of the crowd on the stadium side. The upper deck wasn't that full. The bowl committee didn't sell seats in the upper corner or endzone and the crowds along the upper sidelines were somewhat scattered. Even though the Gophers sold out their allotment, the Gopher section in the upper deck wasn't full and people up there probably found better seats to sit in. It was pretty full in the lower deck and some Gopher fans found their way to the unsold lower sections down the right field line. The crowd in my section was pretty into it after the first touchdown but there weren't a lot of big plays afterwards to maintain that level of enthusiasm. The crowd started to thin in the 4th quarter probably due to the late game time.
 

For the amount of money to get there, I’d figure a way to make it a nice vacation for the entire family including the grandkids.

I wouldn’t do it in this Covid times and risk cancellations.
 



Good contingent of Gopher fans at all the events we attended. We sat at the same table with Gopher fans from TX, CA & LV at the Tailgate. Our games tickets were in the temporary seats behind the Gopher bench and fans there seemed pretty enthusiastic. Our Cheer squad was right in front of us, so I’m sure that made a difference.
 

Had fun at that game. The guy I was sitting next to was a high school athletic director in Gilbert, AZ. He brought his college frosh and high school sons with him. He said that the bowl had provided free tickets, lots of them, to local high schools. I talked to other people who also had been given gratis tickets. They were working hard to make the stadium appear to be occupied.
 

It was an interesting bowl experience.

Chase Field is a nice enough venue, the opening/closing of the roof was cool, but what a weird place to watch football (obviously the field itself was a joke). Acoustically speaking, the place is absolutely MASSIVE so I realized pretty quickly that noise wasn't going to carry very well, and that my usual crowd pump up antics were not going to have the desired effect.

I was in the 300 level opposite the Gopher bench around the 5 yard line. We had a good contingent in our and the neighboring sections but as others have said, far from full.

Gopher fans outnumbered WVU fans probably 10-1, but those Mountaineers know how to PARTY.

Downtown PHX is a shithole. Homeless people everywhere, vagabonds begging for $$, etc. Have been to the Valley/Scottsdale a bunch of times, this was/is my first downtown PHX...yuck
 




Would have loved to go to this as I'm leaving for Tucson tomorrow. If I wasn't driving, I might have considered it. The wife put a cabosh on this as we would have had to leave the day after xmas.
 

I was hoping for 35,000-40,000 because I got my fellow ndsu fans chirping me saying "fcs title game in Frisco will have 22,000-23,000 with 1500 SRO tickets...why would you want to be FBS in a bowl game in 1/3 full stadium"

























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isn't tere
 




bisonation said:
I was hoping for 35,000-40,000 because I got my fellow ndsu fans chirping me saying "fcs title game in Frisco will have 22,000-23,000 with 1500 SRO tickets...why would you want to be FBS in a bowl game in 1/3 full stadium"
hisn't tere
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The gophers 1/3 full stadium will garner more interest on TV than their JV game will. Simply put no one cares about FCS games.
 



my point is, gotta be 100,000 Minnesota snowbirds easily down there.
 



bisonation said:
I was hoping for 35,000-40,000 because I got my fellow ndsu fans chirping me saying "fcs title game in Frisco will have 22,000-23,000 with 1500 SRO tickets...why would you want to be FBS in a bowl game in 1/3 full stadium"

























h



isn't tere
Click to expand...

Moms and dads across the country watch JV games all the time. WGAF. Irrelevant.
 


Gilthorp57 said:
Definitely an older crowd. Gopher fans outnumbered Mountaineer fans by far. The game was past everyone's bedtime in my opinion. Despite trials and tribulations (looking at you, Sun Country) the Missus and I enjoyed ourselves.
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Aah, those snowbirds! They couldn't stay late. They didn't want to go too far past their bedtime.
 

So impressive playing a National championship in a cute little 15k seat soccer field so big time
 

Both the North Dakota State and South Dakota State playoff games were great fun - solid football equal to the 1A bowl games. (Why doesn't the NCAA drop this FCS stuff and just go to 1A and 2A?)
 

Great Plains Gopher said:
Both the North Dakota State and South Dakota State playoff games were great fun - solid football equal to the 1A bowl games. (Why doesn't the NCAA drop this FCS stuff and just go to 1A and 2A?)
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FCS is just a rebrand of 1-AA that puts less of a fine point on the division’s secondary status.
 


hungan1 said:
Aah, those snowbirds! They couldn't stay late. They didn't want to go too far past their bedtime.
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The Minnesota crowd was pretty decent, and the old timer snowbirds did their best, but it was pretty lackluster in terms of atmosphere. The band was very loud and did their part, but the late start, and bungled scoring opportunities early sort of knocked down the crowd a little, with the late start again not helping with the less lively fans in attendance.

It seemed like there was a pretty big player family contingent next to the band in the end zone behind the first base dugout, and that seemed to be the most riled up part of the Gopher contingent.

I actually thought the road crowd at Northwestern this year, and for sure Colorado had a lot ore fire than the Gopher crowd in Phoenix, although it was not bad.

My guess is I am pretty spoiled by our home crowd that has emerged. The lack of a any real student section probably had something to do with it, the Student Section has raised the bar at home since late 2018 and for sure 2019 drives the whole experience at home now.
 

I was at the game in our section around the 5 yard line just down the 3rd base line and it was a pretty decent gopher crowd. Some of the hesitation to get wild was possibly because of Covid. At first when I went to give high fives after the first touchdown I received more odd looks than actual high fives. Then again in the restroom line the same thing. Fun game me to watch, since it was a dominating performance by the defense, I made it a point to watch #47 the whole second half and he was the leader of that defense, always directing and in the right spot. Really different but fun to focus on defense assignments.
 

Most of the game was...pretty boring.
 

SonoranGopher1 said:
Some of the hesitation to get wild was possibly because of Covid. At first when I went to give high fives after the first touchdown I received more odd looks than actual high fives. Then again in the restroom line the same thing.
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High-fiving in the restroom?
 

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