Alabama using ticket rule to go full petty with Texas fans

2023-09-06 09:51

Alabama hosts Texas in by far the biggest college football game of Week 2 and the Crimson Tide are clearly not above playing some mindgames.

The Alabama Crimson Tide answered one massive question in Week 1, so definitively that it might've never been a question at all for Nick Saban. Throughout much of the offseason, the buzz was that Bama was still undecided at quarterback between Jalen Milroe, Ty Simpson and late-transfer newcomer Tyler Buchner.

After dominating Middle Tennessee and playing every meaningful snap, it's clear that Milroe is QB1. And it's a good thing that the Tide figured that out so quickly with one of their biggest games of the season on deck: A Week 2 visit from the Texas Longhorns.

Milroe looked more than ready for that challenge in Tuscaloosa on Saturday in the season opener. But just to give the relatively inexperienced quarterback a little boost, Alabama is cooking up some mindgames courtesy of the SEC's ticketing rules.

Because Texas has not yet joined the conference -- they'll do so starting next season -- the Crimson Tide are not required by league rules to allot at least 2,000 tickets in the lower level to the visiting team. And as reported by The Tuscaloosa News, they won't. Instead, all 5,000 visiting tickets handed out to Longhorns fans will be in the upper levels of Bryant-Denny Stadium, as will the Texas band.

Alabama football: Crimson Tide get petty with Texas' ticket allotment

Obviously, we're talking about a matchup between No. 3-ranked Alabama and No. 11 Texas -- that's enough reason alone to be petty about something like visiting tickets. But the Crimson Tide also might have another reason.

Alabama athletics director Greg Byrne, via The Tuscaloosa News, insinuated that Texas had some similar shenanigans for Crimson Tide visitors when the two programs met in Austin last season.

"We are able to reciprocate a similar seating arrangement to what we had last year in Austin," he said.

Mental warfare and college football go hand-in-hand, particularly when it's a massive game involved. Alabama and Texas could be a battle for early College Football Playoff candidacy, so it only figures that the Tide would be ready to pull out all of the stops.