‘Better than going to Disney World': Fans revel in CFP debuts at campus sites

Forget the cost, the frenzied planning and the timing around the holidays. SMU fan Will Howard is living the dream: His beloved Mustangs are in the 12-team hunt for a national championship, and he’s going to ride it to the end.

“It’s better than going to Disney World,” Howard said. “Because we always knew that we could go to Disney World, right? We never knew that we’d actually have this type of opportunity.”

SMU, Indiana, Penn State and Tennessee are all first-time participants in the playoff at campus sites starting Friday night, joining a club dominated over the first 10 years by the titans of the sport that this year includes Clemson, Georgia, Ohio State and Texas. Although many fans will head into frigid conditions and enemy territory, the sense of bliss outweighs the unknown.

“I’ve been an SMU fan close to 30 years now, and I’ve never seen this level of excitement,” Howard said.

Campus games

The FBS has finally caught up to the Championship Subdivision, which for decades has held campus playoff games in early winter in places that don't show up on travel destination brochures.

But will fans travel this weekend?

By the looks of booked travel packages, the answer is a resounding yes. Games at Ohio State versus Tennessee and at Notre Dame against Indiana are sellouts, while the stands are expected to be close to full at 106,000-seat Beaver Stadium for SMU at Penn State, as well as Clemson's matchup at Texas. Fans still seeking tickets are asked to look on the secondary online market.

For some, there's an extra challenge. Penn State, Indiana and SMU are holding commencements on their respective campuses this weekend. Indiana moved up its ceremonies several hours on Friday to give fans time to plan for the night game in South Bend.

For those who do their homework, there are hotel rooms available, although that might require extra travel and cost. Some fans are skipping the overnight stay altogether. Howard, who requested the maximum-allowed eight game tickets at $200 apiece, plans to fly into State College, Pennsylvania, on Saturday morning for a noon kickoff, then leave later that day.

Have-nots no longer

National coach of the year Curt Cignetti has restored a spark to an Indiana program that has seen nothing like this in more than a half century.

“IU’s been waiting for somebody to kind of come in and change the culture of the program,” said Brett White, whose father and grandfather played football for the Hoosiers. “The fans have kind of just been waiting for an explosion to happen in Bloomington, and this season was just perfect. It’s really been fun.”

Indiana went 9-1 in the 1967 regular season, then lost to O.J. Simpson and Southern Cal in the Rose Bowl. Coach Bill Mallory had three eight-win seasons from 1984 to 1996. The best chance came in 1987, when Indiana lost a key matchup at Michigan State that sent the Spartans — not the Hoosiers — to the Rose Bowl. There was just one winning season from 1995 to 2018.

“If you’re an IU fan, you kind of have post-traumatic stress disorder all the time,” said Timber Tucker, an Indiana season ticket holder since 2000.

Now, going to the College Football Playoff is “otherworldly,” Tucker said. “Everybody’s looking at each other going, ‘what is going on? This is crazy.'”

Back from the dead

SMU is already in unchartered waters, appearing in the Atlantic Coast Conference championship game in its first season in the league. The school sat in obscurity for decades after receiving the so-called death penalty administered by the NCAA for a pay-to-play scandal that wiped out the 1987 and 1988 seasons. It took nine years for SMU to put together a winning record after that, and its first bowl in the aftermath didn't come until 2009 under coach June Jones.

Brian Cassidy's daughter is captain of SMU's cheer team. He plans to stay with family in Pennsylvania and attend Saturday's game at Penn State. He said there has been "40 years of just misery, and now we're on one of the highest of highs making the playoffs," Cassidy said. "The excitement is palpable."

Clemson on the road

For Clemson fans, this is old hat. The Tigers are making their seventh appearance in the CFP. But this quest starts on the road.

Chandler Bolt grew up 15 minutes from Clemson's campus and is now a book publishing company CEO in Texas. When the first-ever meeting between Clemson and Texas was announced, “everyone was blowing up my phone,” he said.

Clemson won national championships after the 2016 and 2018 seasons and lost in title games two other times. Bolt has attended nearly every one of those, but he's been to more Texas than Clemson games in the three years since moving to Austin.

Clemson made its way into the playoff field on the final weekend by winning the Atlantic Coast Conference championship game after losing to South Carolina in its last regular-season game.

“This year feels different because it’s an accident,” Bolt said. “It just feels like we’re playing with house money.”

Heading to the Horseshoe

From the moment Ohio State was matched against Tennessee, Earl Brown began searching for tickets.

Brown will see his 355th consecutive game, including bowls, on Saturday night, accompanied by his wife, Judy, along with several friends and relatives. The consulting company owner hasn’t missed a game since midway through the 1996 season.

“Tennessee fans realize this is not regular season,” said Brown, 75, of Louisville, Tennessee. “This is big time. And our plans are to win four games.”

The Browns will be outnumbered by scarlet and gray-clad Buckeyes fans and relish every moment.

"I’ve always heard about Ohio State football, and now I’m ready to go experience it,” Brown said.

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AP Sports Writer Gary Graves contributed to this report.