USC managed to make national news under less than ideal circumstances after a remarkable amount of students left Williams–Brice Stadium in the third quarter of the Vanderbilt game a couple weeks ago. There was a range of excuses for the mass exodus involving everything under the sun: lack of hydration, the unentertaining blowout score and quite literally being under the blistering sun for far too long.
Undoubtedly embarrassed by the media, coach Spurrier and even the players themselves, USC has managed to put together a plan to remedy the stadium desertion in an impressively short amount of time.
After struggling with the very same problem much of last year and doing little to tackle it, it’s taken USC a mere three weeks since the problematic Vanderbilt weekend to hatch a plan full of incentives that should greatly benefit students on gameday and keep them in the stadium to support our Gamecocks.
First and foremost are the extra loyalty points, which the school plans to grant via vouchers given to any student that stays for the entire game. As it stands, the vouchers can be cashed in at Davis Field on the following Monday or Tuesday.
USC also plans to add CarolinaCard readers so more students can use their Carolina Cash to buy concessions.
Considering the nightmare that is post–game transportation, the school will also implement a sign to show the estimated time students will be waiting in line. It’s a small move that in some way combats the terrible anticipation when waiting for those buses to arrive. And finally, water bottles will be sold for a dollar in the fourth quarter — a no–brainer considering we are in Columbia, S.C., and it’s way too easy to get dangerously dehydrated after spending the better part of a day tailgating and then packing into an open-air stadium.
We can’t muster a single complaint about any of these solutions, and we find all of them to be appropriate and incorporated in an unusually timely manner, considering the school’s past with similar issues.
Perhaps it was the lambasting we got from the media and our football team, or maybe USC is stepping up their game, but either way, we’re happy to know that they listened to our commentary and acted punctually and accordingly.