This year's Northwestern games will have more purple in the stands than ever before. The Wildcats announced that they have sold more season tickets than ever before and they've changed their ticketing policies — and added "Purple Pricing"— to make sure they can maximize the amount of purple in the stands, particularly for the big games.
While the Ohio State and Michigan games should have electric environments, there will likely be plenty of empty seats for some of the non-marquee games, and a look at how NU's tickets are performing on the secondary market can be telling. As expected, prices for the OSU and Michigan games are high, but they're still quite low for the non-conference opponents — even BCS conference foe Syracuse. Exhibit A: You can buy 40 tickets to watch NU vs. Maine for the price of the cheapest ticket for the OSU game. However, NU has to be pleased that the games with the fewest number of tickets available are the OSU and Michigan games. Those numbers will rise when tickets are mailed out, but it shows that the new ticketing strategies have been at least somewhat beneficial.
The away games are interesting, as well. Not surprisingly, the three teams with the biggest fan bases — Nebraska, Iowa and Wisconsin — have the most expensive ticket prices. The Land of Lincoln "rivalry," however, doesn't seem too heated. Here's a look at all of this year's secondary market ticket prices, via TiqIQ. (More details here)
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Syracuse — Get-in: $4, Average: $37
Western Michigan — Get-in: $3, Average: $28
Maine — Get-in: $3, Average: $25
Ohio State — Get-in: $120, Average: $222
Minnesota — Get-in: $10, Average: $53
Michigan — Get-in: $60, Average: $151
Michigan State — Get-in: $17, Average: $80
Away
Cal — Get-in: $4, Average: $46
Wisconsin — Get-in: $73, Average: $120
Iowa — Get-in: $82, Average: $170
Nebraska — Get-in: $84, Average: $214
Illinois — Get-in $8, Average: $40