Yesterday the athletic department announced the worst kept secret in sports: Marquette will open the upcoming men's basketball season against Ohio State in the 2012 Carrier Classic. The game will be played on the deck of the decommissioned USS Yorktown in Charleston, South Carolina. Obviously, this has led to a great deal of excitement amongst Marquette fans, and I'm sure it's done the same in the Buckeye fan base as well. The excitement has led to a couple of interesting posts on Twitter:
— Meghann Price (@smilinangel709) August 1, 2012
@anonymouseagle@muathletics Dumb question for you- Nov 9 vs OSU, tickets only for military? Or will tix be sold to public?
— B (@3g0ggles) August 1, 2012
@southworks78@rdrsouthdeering@mumobb Roadtrip!!!"#mubb opens 12-13 campaign 11/9 vs Ohio State in Carrier Classic. bit.ly/MbPpZk"
First things first: I love the excitement for the game expressed in both of these tweets. I'm glad that both of you are paying close attention to the MU schedule for the upcoming season.
But there's almost no chance that anyone without a service record in the US Armed Forces is setting foot on the deck of the Yorktown to watch this game. Straight from the press release:
This year’s Carrier Classic® will again provide no-cost tickets for members of the military and veterans.
Last year's Carrier Classic provided seating for 7,500 spectators, and the Yorktown is both shorter and thinner than the host of last year's game, the USS Carl Vinson. In his recent mailbag on GoMarquette.com, Athletic Director Larry Williams said he expects the capacity to be in the range of just 4,000 seats.
Ultimately, the point of the game is to provide an event for current and former members of the US Armed Forces in correlation with Veterans' Day. There's no reason for anyone else to get tickets to the game, so there's no reason to worry about it. Marquette and Ohio State fans should be honored that their teams are included in the event, and the athletic department is going to have enough to worry about for the game without getting calls about purchasing tickets for the game. So let's move on to more important things, like thinking about what MU's uniforms for the event will look like.