WSU”s season tickets on pace to exceed 2004

PULLMAN – Washington State football season ticket sales are likely to exceed last year’s record-setting total, according to WSU director of external affairs Pete Isakson.

With the school still counting final season ticket renewal forms, it appears the Cougars will almost certainly push past the 15,447 sold in 2004. That was the most the school could sell because it had blocked out the remaining seats for other uses, but this year WSU has 1,000 additional seats – formerly part of the visiting school allotment – that will be dedicated to season tickets.

Isakson said during weekend that approximately 1,000 accounts had not been renewed, but the postmark deadline just passed Friday and WSU is still processing renewals. Already, there are more than 400 names on a waiting list, and each account could mean multiple season-ticket requests.

“Our hope is that we renew at that 90 percent clip. That’s kind of the clip you want to have year in and year out,” Isakson said. “And then our waiting list will help take care of the rest.”

Television changes

While the Pac-10 is instituting instant replay for all its conference games this fall, Fox Sports Northwest will no longer show replays of Cougars games on Sundays, as it has in recent years.

Isakson and athletic director Jim Sterk said FSN was getting low ratings on the replays and refused to include them in the contract renewed with WSU.

In return, however, the Cougars will be featured in a weekly magazine-style show on the network. The show will be a half hour and run at the same time each week, according to Isakson, though the exact time has not been worked out. Overall, WSU stands to gain from $50,000 to $75,000 a year under the new agreement.

For non-televised games, with no Fox crew present for the day-after replay, Isakson and Sterk said there will have to be at least three cameras set up by the school for the purposes of instant replay.

Notes

Isakson said the Cougars’ second game of the season, Sept. 9 at Nevada, has been confirmed as a nationally televised game on ESPN. Kckoff time has not been set, but it’s likely it will resemble WSU’s Friday night ESPN game last season at New Mexico, which started at 4 p.m. … Contracts have not been finalized with Fox Sports Northwest to televise the opener against Idaho on Sept. 1, but it appears to be just a matter of time before that deal is completed. … Sterk said the Grambling start will probably be in the late afternoon Sept. 17 at Seattle’s Qwest Field.