It’s bad news if you used to scalp student tickets to get into the game, but otherwise the new online system seems to be a good step forward. The Red & Black agrees.

Instead of waiting in line at Stegeman for hours in the summer heat, “tickets” will be bought online, added to the student’s account, and a scanned student ID at the gate will verify the admission – there will be no paper student tickets. There will also be a pool of unused or returned student tickets if someone can’t use the tickets they purchased.

One development I really like is the official recognition of first-come, first-served seating in designated student seating areas. Of course much of student seating has operated more or less along these lines for years, but doing away with reserved student seating in certain sections will only encourage students to arrive early for the games. (Now if they could only do something about the alums…) If there’s going to be a challenge, it’s going to be enforcing that the first-come, first-served seating only goes to students. I’m surely not the only one who knows fans who have tickets elsewhere in the stadium but head over to the student section as soon as they’re in the gate.

As for the rest of us, don’t forget that the Hartman Fund deadline of February 15th is just ten days away.