Tickets will be released today for the EMU-sponsored BCS Championship Game watch party in McArthur Court.
The watch party was originally planned for the EMU Ballroom, but University President Richard Lariviere urged organizers to move the party to a larger venue to accommodate as many people as possible.
Organizers will release 6,000 free tickets on a website designed for this event in particular. The tickets will initially be available to students and by Thursday, remaining tickets will be released to the public. Once a ticket is obtained, the ticket holder needs to print out the ticket in its PDF format and present it at the door of Mac Court — the printed barcode will get the ticket holder in.
Plans for a University-sponsored watch party started in December, as the Ducks earned their ticket to the BCS National Championship Game in Glendale, Ariz. However, it was decided early on to make the watch party available to the general public as well as students.
“It became a groundswell of interest, making it more of a community event,” interim EMU Director Wendy Polhemus said. “It’s focused to students first, but if there are remaining seats left, it goes to the community.”
Polhemus said organizers will place four giant projection screens in the center of Mac Court facing north, south, east and west. There will also be concessions, and organizers are trying to pull together raffle prizes and print T-shirts.
EMU Marketing is overseeing the ticketing website, EMU Marketing Coordinator Lee LaTour said.
“My designing students figured out what to make the site look like, and my programming students are making it work,” LaTour said.
University senior Josh Yaganeh works for EMU Marketing and helped program the website.     
“We’ve written our own ticketing, confirmation and scanning system,” Yaganeh said. “The hard part was figuring out the logistics of confirming a valid barcode that could only be claimed once.”
Yaganeh, who will be scanning tickets at Mac Court’s doors, said he thinks the event is important.
“People can hang out with their fellow fans in Mac Court, and rather than having a living-room showing, you can get to be part of something bigger,” he said.
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