Are you a college football fan who struggles to find flights to follow your team on the road? Is getting from Tallahassee to South Bend for Seminols at Irish just too difficult to make it happen? Well, Delta has apparently heard you, and they’re trying to help.
The airline announced more than fifty new direct flights specifically designed to get college football fans to their games. And we’re pretty thrilled about it.
From our friends at The Points Guy, they compiled a list of the new Delta offerings, and the list is impressive:
- Sept. 1: LSU versus USC in Las Vegas — Baton Rouge, Louisiana, to Las Vegas
- Sept. 14: Alabama at Wisconsin — Birmingham to Madison, Wisconsin
- Sept. 21: Tennessee at Oklahoma — Knoxville, Tennessee, to Oklahoma City
- Oct. 5: Tennessee at Arkansas — Knoxville to Northwest Arkansas
- Oct. 12: Ohio State at Oregon — Columbus, Ohio, to Portland, Oregon, and Minneapolis to Eugene, Oregon
- Oct. 19: South Carolina at Oklahoma — Columbia, South Carolina, to Oklahoma City
- Oct. 26: Missouri at Alabama — Kansas City to Birmingham
- Nov. 2: UNC at FSU — Raleigh-Durham to Tallahassee
- Nov. 9: Florida at Texas — Gainesville, Florida, to Austin; Tampa to Austin; and Orlando to Austin
- Nov. 9: Washington at Penn State — Seattle to Pittsburgh
- Nov. 9: Iowa at UCLA — Des Moines to Los Angeles
- Nov. 9: FSU at Notre Dame — Tallahassee to South Bend
- Nov. 16: Texas at Arkansas — Austin to Northwest Arkansas
- Nov. 23: Kentucky at Texas — Lexington, Kentucky, to Austin
- Nov. 23: Alabama at Oklahoma — Birmingham to Oklahoma City and Huntsville, Alabama, to Oklahoma City
- Nov. 30: Oklahoma at LSU — Oklahoma City to Baton Rouge
And here’s the press release from Delta: https://news.delta.com/delta-game-day-ready-flights-college-footballs-biggest-matchups-fall
Taking the Sept. 21st matchup of Tennessee at Oklahoma as an example, prior to Delta introducing a direct flight, the next best option was a United flight through Chicago, which would take nearly six hours on the outbound, and 5 to 7 hours on the return. Now, it’ll be about a two hour flight to go from Knoxville to Oklahoma City. That’s a game changer for fans.
Of course, there’s a flip side to that, which is … the price. Sure, the time savings are great, but the roundtrip flight is almost $800, which is outrageous.
Unfortunately, the other options aren’t any better. The best available flight on United – with much worse times – doesn’t save much money.
Of course, there’s nothing new here: getting from a small or secondary airport to another small or secondary airport has always been expensive and inconvenient. We just hate seeing that these new flights are so expensive. And in case you’re wondering, booking with miles isn’t cheap either: 74,000 points on Delta, and 61,000 points on United.
Of course, these rates can change based on how the flights sell. If people don’t book them, the prices might fall. But given the popularity of sports travel these days, our guess is that the prices will probably hold up.
So if you’ve been trying to get somewhere out of the way for college football, these new Delta flights at least represent shorter and easier options. Our suggestion: click the “track prices” button on Google Flights to keep an eye on these prices. If they fall, you’ll be notified.
