Dan Radakovich Provides More Clarity On What Game Day Will Look Like
The 2020 college football season in Clemson is going to different. It's as simple as that.
On Thursday the school announced a plan that would allow for approximately 19,000 fans inside Death Valley for games this fall. At the same time, the school also asked that fans not tailgate in the parking lots.
On Friday morning, Clemson athletic director Dan Radakovich said that decision was made with the safety of the entire campus in mind.
"It really is one of those things where we need to protect the environment of campus," Radakovich said. "You know we have students who will be here once we have our first opening game. We want our students to be able to have a safe environment on campus. We don't want athletics to be the cause for any issues associated with the potential closure of campus by having so many people out and about in a tailgating environment."
What you won't see on campus this fall is the large gatherings with family and friends gathered together under tents while eating and watching other games from around the country. However, hanging out outside your vehicle with the group you came in with is something Radakovich said shouldn't be an issue, as long as it is done responsibly.
"We've asked our fans who are going to have the ability to come to our games, park socially distant, and not to have trailers, not to have tents. Does that mean someone can't get there, you know when we open the parking lots, three hours before the game, get out with the people inside their car, have a chicken-drumstick and a Coca-Cola, that's not going to be a problem, we're ok with that."
One of the things that wasn't specified in the school's announcement on Thursday was how student tickets would be handled. Radakovich provided more clarity on that subject today, giving details on exactly where they would sit and how many student tickets would be available.
"The students will be in the south upper deck," Radakovich said. "Those of you who are familiar with the stadium understand that the south upper deck is an isolated area. There's one way in. Well, a couple of ways in and a couple of ways out but you can't go anywhere but south upper deck.
"To keep them in their environment we wanted to place them in an area where that would be safe. We're looking at probably in the neighborhood of 2,200 to 2,300 student tickets. It's approximately the same percentage that they would have in a normal environment in Memorial Stadium."
Two more topics that were addressed on Friday were how seating on the iconic Hill would be handled, as well as what the specific plan for the Tiger Band was going to be.
"As it relates to the Hill, the band is going to be on the Hill," Radakovich said. "And part of the reason for not putting students on the Hill and keeping them in the south upper deck is that the band kind of stays in place during the entire game does not walk around the stadium.
"We didn't want to have students on the Hill because then at that point in time, they would be interacting with the fans who are in the lower deck. So, given the way the stadium is pulled together, it looked like a really great opportunity and option for us to place our students in the south upper deck, it will only be students there, and put the band on the hill."
However, one of the biggest game day traditions will be kept in place. Fans will still get to see the Tigers run down the Hill as Radakovich confirmed that the team would still load the buses to take the short trip around the stadium and make their traditional entrance into Memorial Stadium.
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