On September 3, the Aer Lingus College Football Classic will take place at the Aviva Stadium between Boston College and Notre Dame. In terms of scope and ambition, it’ll be the biggest American football game every played in this country. (Tickets are still available at Ticketmaster.)
College football teams are the size of small armies so getting two of them across the Atlantic - on top of staging a truly memorable spectacle for both the locals and those who’ve traveled over for it - is a truly epic task. Luckily, the organisers of the Aer Lingus College Football Classic have employed the best in the business: On Location Experiences.
Don Renzulli of On Location was in Dublin this week as planning for the Aer Lingus College Football Classic begins to step up a level. Renzulli has had a fascinating career in staging massive sports events in North America --- he worked on 33 Super Bowls and as well as the NHL Winter Classic --- and this week I sat down with him to discuss his lifetime learnings from staging the world's largest sporting events as well as his expectations for September’s game.
Years of planning go into staging events like the Aer Lingus College Football Classic and the Super Bowl, as Renzulli knows better than anyone.
“In a couple of weeks, the host cities for Super Bowl 53 (2018) and Super Bowl 54 (2019) will be announced and the next day, planning on those Super Bowls will begin. They have to get in early. They have to secure 27,000 hotel rooms. They have to secure all the other venues for parties, media, whatever. And then the league will come in with all their people and then decide how they’re going to use it.”
Renzulli has worked on many of the most memorable American sporting events of the last twenty year, though he says the most challenging and rewarding project was Super Bowl XXXVI, the first Super Bowl after 9/11. Staging a Super Bowl with U2 as halftime entertainment is one thing, but doing it against the backdrop of heightened fear of terrorism is another. Yet, thanks to meticulous planning and the cooperation of everyone from the Secret Service to the New Orleans police department, everything came off okay. The game is now remembered as one of the most best Super Bowl's ever played.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZL6sUdma57I
Renzulli has lived every sports fan dream - he’s been front and centre for 33 Super Bowls - but he says when you’re at these events, they’re almost impossible to enjoy.
“Because you’re so immersed in it...you troubleshoot for so many things happening, but that’s not necessarily how things turn out. You really enjoy when it’s over and you walk down on the field and you see everyone’s been happy. But no you don’t enjoy it.”
Every New Year's Day since 2008, the NHL stages an outdoor hockey game. This game - the Winter Classic - has become one of the biggest dates on the North American sporting calendar. Amazingly, an outdoor hockey game was a concept that seemed impossible twenty years ago, but Renzulli was instrumental in bringing the sport into the open air at the height of winter. This article from 2010 charts a day in his very busy life, as the NHL brought hockey to America's most famous baseball stadium, Fenway Park.
"At the end of the day, it’s a regular season game that we create all this hype around. That’s what we’re trying to do here. Bringing American football to Ireland and creating a big event --- that’s what we’re trying to do.
Renzulli sees great potential for the Aer Lingus College Football Classic and seemed particularly excited about turning Dublin into an American football hub for the first weekend of September. Among Dublin’s core strengths, he said, is having a stadium in the city centre. Compare that to the last Super Bowl, which was played in Santa Clara, Calfornia, while all the pregame festivities took place in San Francisco, an hour away.
While the game is obviously of huge interest to people in Ireland, it's often forgotten how much the players and coaches value being a part of these occasions.
“Some of these kids who are coming over --- this might be their only time to travel. But when we stage these events, we ask ourselves ‘how do we make these guys feel special?’ So for the hockey game in LA, we carted the players to center field and they got to see Dodger Stadium and they saw 50,000 people in the stadium. They never saw that before. They usually see 18,000-20,000 people a night. And then they were led out by Wayne Gretzky. The USC marching band was there. They walked out through palm trees. We had KISS performing. So it was pretty special and for these guys, this is something they’ll always remember. Win or lose, they’d tell us how much it meant to them.”
Whether it's for casual sports fans and serious NFL nuts, Renzulli is confident that the Aer Lingus College Football Classic will deliver a brilliant afternoon’s entertainment.
"It’s the evolution from high school to college to pros. There’s some great football when you start to understand the game. I’m passionate about it because I’ve been around it for so long, but I think the more time people spend with the sport, the popular it will become."
Tickets for the Aer Lingus College Football Classic between Boston College and Georgia Tech are one sale now on ticketmaster.ie. Ticket prices range €35 to €110 for premium level. There are a number of family tickets (2 + 2) available from €120, all subject to booking fees.
