How 2021's Unprecedented Circumstances Have Turned March Madness Into a Tough Ticket

COVID-19 capacity limits and the varying sizes of the men's tournament venues have sent ticket prices soaring.

Jason Heggemeyer is in his 16th year overseeing ticketing at Illinois and he’s not sure he’s seen anything quite like this.

The circumstances are extraordinary. To begin with, the Illini are a No. 1 seed in the NCAA men’s basketball tournament and Big Ten tournament champions and have won seven straight games. They are the second-closest team in proximity to Indianapolis, the central hub of this year’s bubble-style tournament. Yet, because they are opening their tournament run in the smallest of the six venues the NCAA is using and due to COVID-19 capacity reductions, they have almost no tickets for fans.

“We’ve been having to say no a lot,” Heggemeyer says.

Some in Champaign wonder how a No. 1 seed with a campus residing 125 miles away drew a smaller playing venue than, say, No. 3 seed Texas or No. 5 seed Creighton, both playing in Lucas Oil Stadium.

But then again, this is a wacky year and everyone’s learning to deal with it, even the Illini.

“It’s tough and makes us wonder how they determined what team plays in what venue,” Heggemeyer says. “On the other side of the argument, the fact we can have anybody inside is progress and a blessing. Hard part now is we can’t get enough of them in.”

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Welcome to 2021 March Madness, where venue capacity and local COVID-19 ordinances have turned some first-round games into can’t-watch events (at least not in person) and have sent ticket prices varying wildly.

In keeping with the theme of this 2020–21 college sports season, nothing is equal, fair or balanced. In fact, the NCAA is keeping under wraps exactly how many fans will be allowed in each of the six venues, only announcing that an arena’s capacity—which includes teams and game workers—cannot exceed 25%.

While the four Indianapolis venues are expected to be close to that 25% number, their original capacities vary greatly—from 70,000-seat Lucas Oil Stadium to 6,500-seat Farmers Coliseum, where the Illini meet Drexel in a first-round game Friday.

The other two venues, Mackey Arena in West Lafayette and Assembly Hall in Bloomington, are operating under even more rigorous COVID-19 restrictions. For instance, at 14,800-seat Mackey, only 12%, or 1,450 people, will be admitted, says Tom Moreland, an associate athletic director at Purdue. Roughly half of that is for teams and staff members, leaving about 700 seats for fans.

Mackey Arena, the home of Purdue, will serve as a first-round site :: Nikos Frazier / Journal & Courier/USA TODAY Images

At 17,000-seat Assembly Hall, an even smaller percentage is expected. There are few if any general admission tickets available for purchase. Each team playing in Bloomington, in fact, was allotted just 204 tickets while all other venues doled out 350 to teams.

A No. 8 seed playing in Bloomington on Saturday, LSU will use most of its 204-ticket allotment on players’ and staff members’ families. A handful of season ticket holders, as few as 50, might get tickets.

“It’s a weird year,” says Brian Broussard, an associate athletic director at LSU overseeing ticketing. “There’s going to be some people who we’d like to help, but we aren’t able to.”

Tell that to Heggemeyer, whose Illinois fan base is itching to see the school’s best team in more than a decade dance just across the border. Of the six arenas, Farmers Coliseum is the smallest venue by 3,000 seats, trailing Hinkle Fieldhouse (9,100), Mackey, Assembly Hall, Bankers Life Fieldhouse (20,000) and Lucas Oil Stadium.

According to the 25% mandate, about 1,500 people will be allowed in, 700 allotted to teams. That leaves roughly 700 general admission seats available and Heggemeyer believes the actual number is lower, as the NCAA isn’t basing the 25% limit off the full 6,500 capacity. To allow for social distancing, seats closest to the court are off limits.

So how many general tickets are available? Nobody really knows. But there are very few on the secondary market, and the ones that are outrageously priced. For instance, as of Wednesday afternoon, the cheapest ticket on StubHub for Illinois’s opening game against Drexel was $505 a pop with a four-ticket minimum. There were 10 total tickets available. Ticketmaster had even fewer, with six total tickets available for $686 each, at the cheapest.

The demand is off the charts, and not only because of the close proximity or the team’s high seed. Because of state regulations, Illinois fans were not allowed into home games this year, and that includes players’ families.

Almost all of Illinois’s 350 allotted tickets are going to players and staff members’ families and university personnel.

“We have people with names on buildings (on campus) that we can’t help,” Heggemeyer says. “They are so hungry to travel. It’s two hours away. If you’re an Illinois fan, if you don’t get them through the school, you have to find them on the secondary market, but the reality is, there are none on there. You try to be transparent and explain that to your biggest supporters.”

In the interest of fairness, playing locations may change after the first round, but that’s no guarantee, an NCAA spokesperson said. What is guaranteed is that ticket allotments per team will increase with each round. Final Four allotments this year are 750. They are typically about 3,500.

This year’s tournament is somewhat of a perfect storm: Demand is high and supply, because of capacity reductions and venue size, is low. Eight teams are within a 270-mile drive of Indianapolis, including two No. 1 seeds, Illinois (126 miles) and Michigan (266), No. 4 seed Purdue (65) and No. 2 seed Ohio State (175). Basketball powerhouse Michigan State is 259 miles away and fan-favorite Loyola Chicago is 194 miles.

In addition to that, the pandemic is, finally, showing signs of subsiding. Vaccinations have many sports fans restless to return to live events, says Mike Lorenc, who heads ticketing and live events for Google. The latest polling data shows that 18% of people are ready to attend a live event now, the highest it’s been since the pandemic began last March and six points higher than it was just three weeks ago.

“This year’s tournament is unique from any number of factors,” says Patrick Ryan, co-founder of Eventellect, a ticketing strategy company. “A lot of people haven’t been to a college sporting event in 18 months. The smaller venues didn’t have normal on-sales at all, so there are few tickets on the secondary market. There is good travel interest. Indiana is pretty centrally located and it’s a heavy Big Ten tournament.”

Moreland thinks of the Big Dance as the country’s “first step” in returning to major live sporting events. People are willing to travel, at least based on the numbers. The two First Four games at Mackey Arena sold out in 15 minutes, and first-round game tickets were gone in an hour—even before teams were announced.

“This is the state of Indiana and basketball,” he says. “This is what we do.”

The average ticket price this year has been $125, which is a 3% increase from 2019, according to Vivid Seats, a ticket marketplace. For at least the first two weekends, fans are traveling 39% farther to attend games this year than in 2019, likely a result of one tournament site instead of various regional locations across the country. Fan bases from Purdue, Ohio State and Michigan are expected to have the strongest crowds in Indianapolis, according to an algorithm that Vivid Seats uses based on ticket sales.

A notable team missing from that list: Illinois, of course.

Seats or no seats, Heggemeyer expects a strong Illinois presence in Indianapolis over the weekend. The drive is short and the team is so good that many Illini faithful will make the journey over just to be in the city.

There might not be an orange sea in the stands, but there certainly will be one washing across the city’s fine steakhouses and watering holes.

“You see if you can find your way in and if you can’t, you find a place to watch it,” says Heggemeyer. “That’s the end result—you go to the bar.”

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