Williams-Brice Stadium is only allowed to be at 20% capacity this season due to the pandemicGETTY IMAGES
In Columbia, Ben Breiner reports the Univ. of South Carolina yesterday started selling single-game football tickets, something that "points to challenges with getting to capacity in these unusual times." Williams-Brice Stadium is "only allowed to be about 20% full this season because of the coronavirus pandemic." Fans can "buy tickets for the Auburn, Texas A&M and Missouri games, but not Georgia." It "comes a few weeks after the school raised the portion of the tickets allocated to students by more than 1,000 for the Tennessee game." South Carolina's opener had 15,009 as listed attendance, a "few hundred short of a sellout." South Carolina AD Ray Tanner explained that factors for the softer demand included "some level of concern about the pandemic as well as fans losing some parts of the gameday experience such as the band and tailgating" (Columbia STATE, 10/7).
VANDY'S CAUTIOUS APPROACH: In Nashville, Adam Sparks said the reason Vanderbilt's football attendance policy "chose to go students first is that they test students every week on their campus." Vanderbilt's idea was this is "sort of their version of a bubble." On whether the school was too cautious in not allowing players' families into Vanderbilt Stadium, Sparks said, "Nobody knows 100 percent how to handle COVID, so it's hard to say somebody is too cautious" (“Breaking Down the ‘Dores,” Tennessean.com, 10/6).
