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Game day experience at Sun Devil Stadium - Printable Version

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Game day experience at Sun Devil Stadium - Embo - 10-19-2018

I have to do this more often.

I decided to go to this game because my daughter recently relocated to Scottsdale to be with her fiance (an ASU professor, BTW), so I had another reason to visit.  After making plans, it dawned on me that, other than Big Games and bowl games, I haven't done a road trip since my senior year.  Decades ago.  This was just wrong on my part.  My longstanding fellow season ticket holder (we've shared since 1984) retired five years ago.  He's taken at least one road trip a year (has been to UW, OSU, ND, Utah, Northwestern) and went to Oregon a few weeks ago (lucky guy!)  He's had an outstanding time, even with the heartbreaking losses.  I'm several years from retirement, but I have to start traveling more.

I'd never been to Sun Devil Stadium until last night.  However, I have seen it from the air.  I've always thought it was a great looking venue - it had been a classic single level bowl, placed onto the side of a rock outcropping.  But ASU did a major overhaul of the stadium, and I would not say it's aesthetically pleasing.  The biggest work was adding a middle and top tier along both east and west sidelines.  The west addition, with the pressbox, is monstrous.   It's just me, but I would never want a seat on the top tier on the west - it towers over the field, and I would imagine the view would be Goodyear Blimp-like.

Getting to the stadium was a bit of a hassle.  It may be due to my not knowing the optimal route, but I called a Lyft from Scottsdale at 4:40 and we got stuck heading south on Scottsdale road before crossing the river.  The poor driver opted to go west on 10 then head back east toward the stadium.  Much stop and go, but I made it (just barely) for the anthem.  I tipped the driver but that traffic headache could not have made it worthwhile for him.

I wonder if ASU made the same mistake as C.al did for their premium west side seats on the lower bowl.  I saw many grey (empty) seats throughout the game.  You'll understand what I mean when you go to Big Game in a few weeks.  Memorial Stadium will have plenty of yellow vacant seats between the 40's.  C.al alums weren't willing to shell out $100k+ for the privilege.  

The ASU student section was full and rocking (well, their undergraduate enrollment is just a bit larger than Stanford's) but they were relegated to the south end zone.  I do recall that this is not new.  Back in 1979, during the height of the Frank Kush controversy, I read that the students even then had some of the worst seats in the house.

The Stanford section was in the northeast corner.  I'll now bring up this comment:  The loud, canned, popped music during each and every break in the action is an indelible part of college football, alas.  It may have been worse for me compared to Stanford Stadium because the PA system is in part two large speakers on the ends of the north Jumbotron - very close to us.  For better or for worse, ASU has a DJ who mixes the music.  They have the usual individual crowd shots on the scoreboard with the Dance-Cam, Flex-Cam, Hair-Cam, Fan-Cam.  IMNSHO, fewer is better.

I won't go into game-strategy discussions.  I'm sure we had the same conversations in the stands as you had watching the TV regarding the pros and cons of running three times in a row.  But let me tell you what is really worthwhile about being in the stadium of the home team when you are a fan of the visitor.  It happened during JJA-W's TD.  Of course, we were screaming in our section, on the opposite side of the field.  But as you are cheering, you realized that the rest of the stadium is dead silent.  That's awesome to experience.  

After Stanford had taken the 20-6 lead, early in the fourth quarter, Paulsen Adebo picked off the pass with a little less than 12 minutes to go.  I posted this earlier - the ASU fans got up and were leaving en masse.  I was a little surprised by their lack of faith.  I guess they knew something I didn't.  They certainly didn't know what we know...

Other benefits to being there live:  Things not broadcast (as far as I know).  I saw Kaden Smith run unescorted, helmetless, into the tunnel (it was right below us) and back out again, twice.  I don't think there was anything wrong with him, I hope.  I did see Joey Aflieri walk back with the team at the end of the game, wearing a grey T shirt and his right arm in a sling.  I wasn't aware of the injury during the game.

Because the fans had left early, egress was much easier post-game.  I wore my Stanford sweatshirt this AM when my daughter took her dog to the dog park.  A couple of gentle ribs at me - "Oh, ASU fans aren't going to like that" - which were taken in fun.

Hope this wasn't too boring.  I will do this again.  I have made this vow in the past - right after I retire, I plan on going to all 12 games in one season.  And I encourage everyone to take in a road game as well.

RE: Game day experience at Sun Devil Stadium - CornFed - 10-19-2018

Thanks Embo.  That really captured the atmosphere of a night game away.  I haven't been to ASU ever, but I've driven by it a lot and had several friends that went there.  The desert atmosphere appeals to me and the stadium being perched on a massive rock outcropping is cool. 

I commented during the game thread that the camera shots showed a pretty empty stadium, long before the people were said to be leaving.  How was attendance at the peak?  It looks pretty enormous, so I suppose that even if they get twice as many people as Stanford, the stadium still might look relatively empty.

I have been to all the PAC-8 stadia, but I will need to add it to my bucket list to get to the other four some time.  I loved your comments about the silence of the crowd when we do something good.  There is something powerfully satisfying about it.

RE: Game day experience at Sun Devil Stadium - Austroturf - 10-19-2018

Great recap.  Thanks for the live insights.

RE: Game day experience at Sun Devil Stadium - French Rage - 10-19-2018

Was any of traffic due to the Cardinals game last night?  Seems odd for the Pac-12 to have our game right next to an NFL game.

RE: Game day experience at Sun Devil Stadium - stupac2 - 10-19-2018

(10-19-2018, 03:13 PM)French Rage Wrote:  Was any of traffic due to the Cardinals game last night?  Seems odd for the Pac-12 to have our game right next to an NFL game.

IIRC the Pac-12's schedule is released before the NFL schedule. If that's indeed the case, then there's not much they can do about it except only play Thursday games in schools without an NFL team nearby (which isn't that restrictive, you have UA, UO, ORST, WSU, Colorado, Utah, and Cal).

RE: Game day experience at Sun Devil Stadium - Spiny_Norman - 10-19-2018

(10-19-2018, 03:13 PM)French Rage Wrote:  Was any of traffic due to the Cardinals game last night?  Seems odd for the Pac-12 to have our game right next to an NFL game.

The two stadiums in Glendale and Tempe are 26 miles apart. I don't think that there would have been much effect on traffic around Sun Devil Stadium from a game played that far away.

My recommendation to anyone going to a game at Sun Devil Stadium in the future - take the light rail. Cheap, fast and easy. Same advice to anyone going to the Coliseum in LA.

RE: Game day experience at Sun Devil Stadium - Phogge - 10-19-2018

The Cards Stadium is way out in Glendale. Should have had no effect.

CardinalSagehen - CardinalSagehen - 10-19-2018

Great recap, Embo.

I was there, too, and I totally want to do this more often.  At 45, I'm nowhere near retirement, at least as far as I know. And my kids are 10 and 8, so I'm not about to get a weekend hall pass for a Saturday road game.  But I was incredibly lucky to have a work event this Thurs/Fri with colleagues in Tempe. (My wife half-jokingly suspects that I must have scheduled the event intentionally!)

Right where you were held up in traffic before the bridge, near the In-n-Out, I exited my Uber and ran the last mile across the bridge and into the stadium. The game had already kicked-off, so I ran like the wind. I must have been cast some funny looks by Sun Devil fans, but I wasn't about to miss any more of my first true regular season road game, and I didn't care how it looked. I met my ASU grad colleague at our seats by 6:10. He had a couple Coors Lites waiting for me - yes, you can now drink at ASU games until the beginning of the 3rd quarter, a policy which apparently started last year. I'm not accustomed to watching Stanford football with a buzz, so that made the negative running plays go down a little easier.  

I sat behind the Visitors' bench, and all the ASU fans in my section were hospitable. That said, they were extremely chaffed by all the PI and defensive holding calls, to the point of irrationality.  JJAW creates a tough call for the referees no matter what.  

I have to be honest - from my vantage point, it was unclear that a Stanford traveling section even existed. I couldn't really hear the contingent and didn't think to look for it.  But I definitely noticed and appreciated the same ominous hush that came over the stadium when we went up by 14.  A drunk ASU fan even stood up and yelled semi-coherently at the entire section for losing faith so easily.  He elicited a few chuckles but he could not stem the exodus.   

There was something special about being on the road with such a sparse group of alums and fellow fans.  I don't usually get multiple High 5's from random fans leaving Stanford Stadium, but I did last night. Maybe it was the four Coors Lites (that's like two normal beers, right?), or the crowd's somber mood, but I did not feel at any time after the middle of the third quarter like we were actually going to lose grip of the game.  

I impressed my colleague by predicting -2 on first down a few times, and "Shaw never passes when up by 2 scores in the second half", but there was really no joy in that. There was, however, fantastic joy in being present for a Pac 12 road win.