Six thousand tickets requested. Fifty-three tickets awarded. Five thousand, nine hundred forty-seven requests unfulfilled.
These numbers turned Sugar Bowl fever into a major lawsuit as fans fought to see the Fighting Tigers.
Both Illinois and LSU received 15,000 tickets. Illinois students made 26,000 requests, while LSU made nearly 50,000.
Illinois took requests for bowl tickets when it was evident its team would go to a bowl, game. All Illinois tickets went to donors, student season ticket holders and public season ticket holders. No tickets went to the general public.
Since LSU limited the amount of student tickets it was giving out to 2,000, the general public received no tickets, and Ticketmaster sold out. Many fans went to the Illinois Web site to purchase Sugar Bowl tickets.
Robin Kaler, assistant chancellor for public affairs at the University of Illinois, said LSU fans requested about 6,000 tickets from the University of Illinois.
Josh Martin, a senior in criminology, purchased 8 tickets Dec. 9, 2001, on the University of Illinois Web site after finding Ticketmaster sold out of tickets that morning.
Bruce Macmurdo and Martin said after reaching the Web site and going to the page for purchasing tickets, they were asked if they were donors to the school. Both clicked on the link for non-donors.
Then, each got to the order form and the Web site said they had 10 minutes to complete the form, which is how long the Web site would hold the tickets so no one else could buy those.
The university charged their credit cards, and both received a confirmation e-mail. Kaler said people who did not receive tickets received a refund on their credit cards.
Martin heard rumors that some fans would not get tickets after he ordered his and called the ticket office at Illinois to make sure he would receive tickets. The first time he called on Dec. 12, he was told that as long as he had a confirmation number, he had tickets. On Dec. 13, he called again and heard he was not guaranteed tickets. Then on Dec. 16, he received an e-mail saying he did not have tickets.
However, Martin said the Web site did not say “subject to availability” or that there was a priority system in place for the tickets.
The lawsuit stemmed from confirmation letters sent to people requesting tickets on the University of Illinois Web site.
The confirmation letters said, “Thank you for your ticket purchase from the University of Illinois Athletic Ticket Office.” The e-mail then gave the confirmation number on the order.
“Our intent [of the confirmation letters] was just to let people know, yes, we received your order,” Kaler said. “It confused some people, which we regret.”
However, LSU fans who received the letters got a different meaning from them.
“If it didn’t say ‘Thank you for your ticket purchase,’ maybe we wouldn’t have been expecting our tickets,” Martin said.
Kaler said problems arose bcause Illinois had never encountered a problem like this and sold out of tickets.
Fans also were confused by disclaimers Kaler said were on the Web site, stating the university’s priority system for distributing tickets. “Part of the problem is that people don’t always read [the information presented],” Kaler said.
Kaler said the university distributed tickets using a ticket request system the school has for all sports.
Both Macmurdo and Martin took action after receiving the e-mail saying their requests would not be filled. While Macmurdo joined a lawsuit with others, Martin wrote a letter to the University of Illinois athletic director and ticket office manager. No Illinois officials responded to his letter.
Ten LSU fans took their cases to court. All 10 plaintiffs had purchased tickets and received confirmations from the University of Illinois.
“There was no question in our minds that we bought the tickets,” said Bruce Macmurdo, who participated in the lawsuit.
On Dec. 27, 2001, state District Judge Kay Bates ordered the University of Illinois to give 10 LSU fans 53 Nokia Sugar Bowl tickets. The case would have been a class action lawsuit if plaintiffs had not reached a settement.
While the 10 plaintiffs received their tickets, the case still is pending.
Kaler said the 53 tickets awarded in the case did not come from the university’s allotted 15,000 tickets, which it had already distributed. “The Sugar Bowl committee helped us get the [53] tickets,” Kaler said. However, the 53 tickets were not seated together.
Fortunately, Macmurdo was one fan who received tickets. Macmurdo had seats on the 15-yard line on the the Superdome’s terrace, across from the LSU section.
Not all fans who ordered tickets from the University of Illinois Web site were able to attend the Sugar Bowl.
Scotty Dykes, an electrical engineering senior, did not spend New Year’s Day in the Superdome celebrating the Tigers’ win against Illinois. “Because I purchased tickets over the Internet, I didn’t think to stand in line for [student] tickets,” he said.