Penn State to play IU at FedEx Field in 2010

DC-area Penn Staters are excited!  This year, we get the hoops squad in Charlottesville.  Next year, football at FedEx and basketball in Blacksburg!

From the Washington Examiner:

http://www.examiner.com/examiner/x-6668-Penn-State-Nittany-Lions-Football-Examiner~y2009m8d26-Penn-State-football-coming-to-Washington-DC-in-2010

For those of you in the Washington D.C. area, this news is especially good for you.

The November 20, 2010 game between Penn State and Indiana will switch locations from Indiana's campus in Bloomington, Indiana to FedEx Field in Landover, Maryland. FedEx Field is home of the NFL's Washington Redskins.

The Herald Times of Bloomington reports that the Redskins approached Indiana about moving their home game to their stadium in exchange for a #3 million payout. The Hoosiers gladly accepted the deal as they annually rank near the bottom of the Big Ten in terms of football money.

“Obviously, it’s very positive for us financially,” Glass said. “When you rank second to the bottom in the conference in money spent per sport, you have to color outside the lines and be open to new ways to generate revenue.”

Indiana generally makes less than $1 million per home game.
- Fred Glass, Indiana Athletic Director via Herald Times

This is good news for Penn State fans as the game will be in a much more Penn State friendly region and most of the 90,000+ seats figure to be filled with fans in blue and white, even though the game will still be considered a "home" game for Indiana. There are a lot of Penn State alumni in the region and this should be a good opportunity for Penn State to come closer to recruits in the area who find it more difficult to make a trip up to Happy Valley.

FedEx Field is about three and a half hours away from Beaver Stadium. Part of the deal to move the game requires Indiana to sell 7,000 tickets, which should not be too much of a problem.

Indiana will make about $2 million more than they would normally make for a home game. They will also scramble to pick up a sixth home game and have reportedly been interested in moving a road game to their stadium with Central Michigan.

Penn State will play in Lincoln Financial Field in 2011 when they pay a visit to Temple.

Thanks to Penn State Talk for the heads up on this tidbit of schedule news.