Raymond James Stadium’s upper deck to open for USF-Miami showdown

For a game that could determine tentative statewide college football supremacy, USF is taking added measures to increase its home-field advantage.

The school announced Sunday that seats in the upper west deck of Raymond James Stadium will be open for Saturday night’s clash between the Bulls (2-1) and eighth-ranked Miami (3-0). The deck, normally closed for Bulls home games, is being made accessible in part due to a record demand of student tickets, which are free to USF students.

The school reported that 13,179 student tickets for the game — made available Friday morning — were claimed within 24 hours. That shattered the old mark of 8,409 claimed within 24 hours for USF’s game last season against No. 10 Alabama.

As of Sunday morning, the student tickets claimed stood at 14,535, breaking the previous record (12,549) for the Bulls’ game against No. 13 Florida in 2021.

The opening of the deck increases stadium capacity to 55,000 seats and can accommodate a student-ticket capacity of more than 15,000 seats while increasing the inventory of publicly available tickets for purchase.

“We need our fans to buy these tickets and fill that joker up,” Bulls coach Alex Golesh said following his team’s 49-24 rout Saturday night of Southern Mississippi. “Man, it will be a fun night in Tampa, (Raymond James Stadium) packed out, green and gold against a really, really good football team.”

Students still wishing to obtain tickets are encouraged to use the HerdPerks app or visit GoUSFBulls.com/studenttickets. The general public can call 1-800-Go-Bulls, or visit Ticketmaster.com to purchase tickets.

Contact Joey Knight at jknight@tampabay.com. Follow @TBTimes_Bulls

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