Colleges, Universities Thinking of Loosening Restrictions on Beer Sales at Football Games

by Jesse Scardina on Tue, Aug 9, 2011 at 9:51PM

Pigskin and a cold one. Few things go together better.

However, beers have been noticeably absent at college football games — which is weird, because college accounts for about 75 percent of the drinking anyone will do in their life.

According to the USA Today, that absence may be no more. A number of universities across the country are changing their alcohol restrictions at games from just the luxury boxes to all in attendance of legal drinking age.

"With the deficits that are being run at some schools getting bigger, you're going to have more and more schools going to it," West Virginia athletic director Oliver Luck told the USA Today.

The Mountaineers will be selling beers for all fans of legal age and are "expecting to profit around $1 million."

With athletic budgets getting sliced across all platforms, more and more universities are looking for ways to increase profit. The number of high-profile schools selling beer to regular fans this fall has doubled since last year, from 10 to 20.

Not all colleges are on board with this drinking game, as Iowa athletic director Gary Barta told the USA Today.

"Right, wrong or indifferent, the college model in a vast majority of the stadiums is not to sell beer in a broad way," he said.

The NCAA doesn't have any rules against selling alcohol during its regular season events, but bans the sale and advertising during their 88 championship events.

Some athletic directors think that the sale of alcohol in the stadium will help eliminate the access of drinking before the game and the sneaking in of alcohol to the event itself.

"There's also the thought that you control the alcohol situation better if you're selling within your stadium," Cincinnati's athletics director Mike Thomas told USA Today.

"Rather than people trying to sneak in alcohol, they can buy it in a controlled environment. Does it curb it completely? Probably not, but I'd guess that it's not happening as often."