Iowa State University held a press conference today welcoming Insight Bowl representatives to town. Of those in attendance was Jay Fields of the Insight Bowl. Here’s a Q&A that reporters had with Fields talking about the 2009 Insight Bowl.
Iowa State has sold around 5,000 tickets so far. Is that a good pace?
JF: Yes. They are on a really good pace. We just announced on Sunday. I think that they got it up on their website Sunday night. I think they’re on a good pace. Of course, you guys have had some weather this week. That causes a little bit of a slow down but it really hasn’t here. We are excited about where they are in their tickets sales and hope it continues. We’d love to see a lot of Iowa State fans come into the valley.
Is there any way to track ticket sales that don’t come directly from the university?
JF: We track that after the game. Right now, we’re just too busy to think about where they are coming from. We’ll certainly visit with Jamie and his staff after the game about how much we saw through our website.
How is Minnesota doing with ticket sales?
JF: I haven’t got a number yet. I know that they aren’t quite at the number Iowa State is but I think their tickets are moving well. We are pleased with that and hope that they bring a lot of fans. Again, the rivalry speaks for itself. These are two well-coached football teams. The student athletes do a great job and hopefully people will come see them play.
What is your pitch to get people to come?
JF: It will get you out of the snow. We had a cold spell this week and it was 58 degrees. All of us who live in Arizona and have thin blood, we’re shivering and wearing big coats. Coming back here kind of gives you that relative feeling that 58 is a really nice number. That’s cool for us. By the time they get there, the weather should be high 60’s and low 70’s. We have 204 golf courses in town, a tremendous amount of sights to see. And of course game day. The game kicks off at 4. We’ll have a New Year’s Eve block party in Tempe that night. Our headlining act is the Doobie Brothers. Fans can go to the game and then slide on over to the block party and see some entertainment and celebrate the New Year’s Eve.
