Tickets to be sold later

By JOE MARCHILENA

Extra basketball season tickets were not for sale Wednesday because of a lack of ID cards,… Extra basketball season tickets were not for sale Wednesday because of a lack of ID cards, according to associate athletics director Jim Earle.

“The cards that were given out [Tuesday] were left over from the original lottery,” he said. “The intention was for the Union to hold on to them until we said ‘go,’ but they started selling them right away.”

Earle said he was unsure which end the miscommunication was on, but it was just “water under the bridge now.”

“I don’t want to blame it on anybody. We have it squared away now,” he added.

Despite the extra tickets sold, only 600 students attended Tuesday night’s game, according to Earle.

“You can say that it’s because it’s Norfolk State, but if the students were truly Panther fans, they should be there,” he said.

If the number of students attending games does not increase, Earle said that the administration might sell those tickets to the general public.

“We have to fill the seats and at this point, if we still aren’t able to fill them, we’ll have to look at other options,” he said. “We have a waiting list that’s over 500 people long that want seats. It’s not fair to our team to have two empty sections.”

Earle said he also wanted to clear up the confusion behind whether or not the season tickets were transferable among students.

“You can give season tickets to any other student as long as they have a Pitt ID card,” he said. “It’s not transferable to Joe Public.”

As for the remainder of the season tickets being sold, Earle said he should know when the cards will be ready by today.

“More tickets will probably be available on Monday and that will be first come, first serve,” Earle said. “There’s a chance it could be [tomorrow], but we haven’t had an answer from the ID center when the printing will be done.”