Brews You Can Use
It's one of the best collegiate developments in decades: Beer is coming to college stadiums. "Beer is sold to the average fan at 22 of 120 major college football stadiums -- more than twice as many as a decade ago -- as schools search for new sources of revenue and, in some cases, counter intuitive ways to curb alcohol abuse. In the past month, Akron and Minnesota gained approval to sell beer at football games this fall, with the Gophers becoming the first school in the Big Ten to tap the keg."
Of course, Ohio State and Michigan are too arrogant to condescend to allow alcohol in their stadiums: "Officials at Ohio State and Michigan, two of the country's richest athletic departments with fans that regularly sell out their 100,000-plus seat football stadiums, said the issue is off the table. Both schools also ban beer advertisements and alcohol in the suites. 'I understand why Akron is doing it,' OSU athletic director Gene Smith said. 'They're trying to do it to enhance their atmosphere. We just don't need to do that.'"
But then again, West Virginia doesn't really need to enhance their atmosphere. From what I've heard, their fans are pretty rabid already, but they've eschewed the Puritan mindset . . . to the tune $520,000 in net profits last year. Those profits can be funneled back into fancier facilities to attract athletes, just as Oregon has used Phil Knight's generous donations to build the best facilities in the United States (each football player with a video game console in his locker), and now they're one of the premier programs in the land.
My prediction: UM and OSU will relent after the rest of the Big Ten gets wet. Hat off to Minnesota's Golden Goofers for starting the trend.
