Once again Nicole needed to be on campus tonight.  With the Northwestern women’s basketball team playing at home I decided to make the trip to Evanston.  I dropped Nicole off at the Sociology department and drove up to Welsh-Ryan Arena.
Obtaining Tickets
Tonight may have been the first time I have paid full price (only $7) for a Northwestern women’s basketball game.  In the past, the women’s games have always seemed to have some special that allowed you to buy a discounted ticket.
The Game
The women pulled off something the men could not …

Once again the wife and I drove to campus. My plan was to attend the Northwestern men’s basketball game versus Penn St. while she worked on campus.
The Game
This was a game Northwestern was “supposed” to win. Penn St. was winless in the Big Ten and Northwestern was on the bubble for their first NCAA Tournament berth in school history. But somebody failed to tell both teams as Penn St. managed their first Big Ten win of the season defeating Northwestern 81-70.
As opposed to Sunday when Northwestern made …

With the wife not getting home until late Tuesday night, I attended the Chicago Bulls game versus the New York Knicks.
Pre Game Dining and Parking
I parked on Washington Blvd. in between Wood St. and Wolcott Ave. for free and walked a few blocks to Billy Goat’s Tavern before the game. This one block on Washington Blvd. (two blocks directly north of the United Center) is the only block north of the arena where you can see the United Center with no parking restrictions.
Obtaining Tickets
I did not have a $10 …

It was a rare event – a weekday afternoon minor league hockey game. And even rarer was that it was taking place on a Monday afternoon. The game had been on my radar for awhile since it would not compete with any other sporting events. There were multiple reasons I wanted to attend this game. First, I love attending weekday afternoon games whenever I can. Second, I have never attended a game at the Rockford MetroCentre. Third, I wanted to see the Chicago Blackhawks …

On a Sunday afternoon when the wife was teaching her ice skating students in a competition, I drove to Evanston for the Minnesota at Northwestern game – a typical way to spend Valentine’s Day :-).
Even before today, Northwestern most likely needed to win out the regular season in order to have any chance of making the NCAA Tournament. And today was one of those days that made you question whether they could do so.
Minnesota had an 8-point lead at halftime. Northwestern closed that lead to two points 3:54 into the …

It was a snowy night to attend the Chicago Blackhawks game. But I managed to make the drive from my home to the United Center in less than 30 minutes. Rather than park for free on the street as I have many times this season, I used one of the parking passes I bought last year from Red Top Parking. I parked in their lot rather than brave the snow on the city streets.
Obtaining TicketsI parked just before 7:30 pm. I expected to see more ticket scalpers walking towards the …

Today I attended a sporting event on Super Bowl Sunday (that was not the Super Bowl). Northwestern scheduled their Sunday afternoon game for 1:30 pm CT, which was perfect timing in order to attend the game and still get back to wherever fans were planning to watch the Super Bowl.
The GameNorthwestern got out to an initial 13-2 lead and their lead never dipped below nine points as the Wildcats defeated Indiana convincingly 78-61. This was Northwestern’s first three-game winning streak versus Indiana since the 1930s – there are …

The main reason I bought Northwestern men’s basketball season tickets this year is that the Ultimate Sports Wife is a Ph.D. student at Northwestern University. We met in undergrad at Northwestern so I do have “another” reason to attend. However, with Nicole spending much of her time on campus, I realized that buying season tickets 1) gives her an incentive to go to campus to work, 2) allows me to attend the basketball games and 3) allows us to spend more time together since we are both on campus – …

For the fourth consecutive weekend, I went on a road trip from Chicago. Three weeks ago I drove to Ann Arbor and the last two weekends I spent time in Indianapolis. Yesterday, I drove to East Lansing, MI for the Northwestern at Michigan St. men’s basketball game. As was the case when I drove to Ann Arbor, I wanted to see Northwestern play at Michigan St. I had not seen a game at the Breslin Center. After last night, I have attended a game at nine Big Ten men’s basketball …

It turns out the Indianapolis Colts were staying in our hotel on Saturday night – so much for the poor reviews on tripadvisor.com. Since the AFC Championship Game did not start until 3 pm we had plenty of time to sleep in and then go to brunch. I had picked out Patachou on the Park for brunch. My first pick, City Café, is closed for some reason on Sundays – even this Sunday with a major football game taking place.
Obtaining TicketsOn Saturday morning, I emailed a guy on craigslist.org about …