I’ve been to Ryan field twice last time maybe a decade ago. I will start by saying I was bouncing between two tailgaters by Mustards, and found the tailgating better than I thought. Very fun, especially the Hawkeye fans, there was actually a very good live band playing near us.
But the game….. Oh my God.
Horrible stadium, actually looks bigger from the outside than it even is. Feels like a big HS team at best. As small as it is, the seats still suck. Finding them is ridiculous. I could barely read players’ numbers, I honestly wasn’t sure if Padilla was really in for Petra’s or what. You couldn’t figure out what was going on.
‘They have a single Main scoreboard for replays etc, it’s set very low so hard to see and they built this weird lame scaffolding system in front of it I think for their junior high-ish sound system, so half the stadium is blocked from seeing it! We couldn’t see replays! So between the awful views, terrible sound, and blocking the scoreboard it was impossible to figure out what’s going on. Plus cell phone reception was terrible so that didn’t help.
Then — as mentioned in previous threads — they had students doing the lamest protest I’ve ever seen on field Delaying the game like 10 minutes. And the dumbest protest I’ve ever seen. Wasn’t a single cause, just apparently multiple students who wrote multiple things about multiple causes basically in crayon on bedsheets that you couldn’t read. NW didn’t have a single security person address it and the kids took their sweet time and after subjecting everyone to it walked off the field with no ramifications. Does NW not actually hire in-stadium security guards? We literally had security guards at the entrance hassling us about my wife’s purse that had metal on it and she was willing to open up for them, but somehow Middle Eastern activist protestors can run onto the field and actively approach players and refs but not a single person goes out to end it? Ummmm…… priorities?
The whole thing was shockingly bush league. I’ve haven’t been to games as much the past few years, but in the past month I’ve been to east Lansing for MSU-Western Kentucky, Iowa City for Iowa-PSU, and now this NW game. Iowa-PSU was one of the greatest environments I’ve ever seen, I was pleasantly surprised by the MSU game day and stadium experience, and shocked how bad NW is. I mean, I have no clue how they are even remotely competitive in the Big 10. It’s terrible.
But the game….. Oh my God.
Horrible stadium, actually looks bigger from the outside than it even is. Feels like a big HS team at best. As small as it is, the seats still suck. Finding them is ridiculous. I could barely read players’ numbers, I honestly wasn’t sure if Padilla was really in for Petra’s or what. You couldn’t figure out what was going on.
‘They have a single Main scoreboard for replays etc, it’s set very low so hard to see and they built this weird lame scaffolding system in front of it I think for their junior high-ish sound system, so half the stadium is blocked from seeing it! We couldn’t see replays! So between the awful views, terrible sound, and blocking the scoreboard it was impossible to figure out what’s going on. Plus cell phone reception was terrible so that didn’t help.
Then — as mentioned in previous threads — they had students doing the lamest protest I’ve ever seen on field Delaying the game like 10 minutes. And the dumbest protest I’ve ever seen. Wasn’t a single cause, just apparently multiple students who wrote multiple things about multiple causes basically in crayon on bedsheets that you couldn’t read. NW didn’t have a single security person address it and the kids took their sweet time and after subjecting everyone to it walked off the field with no ramifications. Does NW not actually hire in-stadium security guards? We literally had security guards at the entrance hassling us about my wife’s purse that had metal on it and she was willing to open up for them, but somehow Middle Eastern activist protestors can run onto the field and actively approach players and refs but not a single person goes out to end it? Ummmm…… priorities?
The whole thing was shockingly bush league. I’ve haven’t been to games as much the past few years, but in the past month I’ve been to east Lansing for MSU-Western Kentucky, Iowa City for Iowa-PSU, and now this NW game. Iowa-PSU was one of the greatest environments I’ve ever seen, I was pleasantly surprised by the MSU game day and stadium experience, and shocked how bad NW is. I mean, I have no clue how they are even remotely competitive in the Big 10. It’s terrible.
