While a total of 23,329 people filled the stand to witness the Carleton Ravens football team’s victory over the University of Ottawa (U of O) Gee-Gees on Oct. 1 at the Panda Game, some Carleton fans found themselves unable to get their hands on tickets ahead of the game.
Students were in turmoil, as tickets sold out everywhere on campus during the week leading up to the game. On Facebook, Carleton students were offering to buy tickets for over the original price, begging for tickets, and even offering to sell friends as collateral.
Eric Childers, the director of ticket operations at TD Place, said both universities were very happy with their students’ reactions and were doing great with sales.
Carleton students were offering to sell their tickets for prices ranging from $40 to $150.
Marc Pitar, a second-year history student at Carleton, tried to sell his ticket on Facebook for $130 above the original price.
“People have said that’s too expensive and asked what I am doing,” Pitar said, and added he would not lower the price. “People think it is an absurd amount to pay but then they go online searching for tickets.”
“I really want to go to the game so I chose a price that would make me feel like it was worth missing. 150 is a good price,” he said.
Unlike Carleton students, U of O students were more than comfortable at the north side with a visible number of seats unoccupied during the game. In comparison, the Ravens side was packed full of students in red.
A number of Carleton students even bought tickets on the U of O side, but flocked over to the Carleton side for the game, according to Natasha McDonough, a second-year law student at Carleton
“I just went onto the TD Place website and bought the uOttawa tickets. They were even cheaper than what Carleton was selling them for,” she said. “At the game, this didn’t cause any problems. We were in Carleton colours and therefore we were assumed to belong to the Carleton side. I never even sat at my [U of O] section seat.”
The day of the game, scalpers drove by Lansdowne along Bank Street, offering to sell tickets for the Carleton side at a fee of $25. None agreed to comment.
According to Jean-François Blondin, the event and ticketing agent at U of O, the Gee-Gees sold 7,873 tickets by the afternoon of Sept. 30, though they did not quite sell all their tickets. Carleton did not provide information on their ticket sales.
According to an announcement by the Canadian Interuniveristy Sport (CIS) on Twitter, the record attendance at the Panda Game marked the highest attendance at a CIS regular season game in the past two decades.
“Panda Game is tradition for the universities in Ottawa, I didn’t want to miss out on watching the Ravens win again,” McDonough said.
