Ad Disclosure
Week 5 gave us a great slate of games that didn’t disappoint involving SEC teams and around the country. We almost saw a few upsets, but top 15 teams survived in Raleigh, Dallas and Athens.
Looking back at Saturday’s schedule of games, let’s take a trip around the country to the five best environments in Week 5:
1. AT&T Stadium
It wasn’t a sold out crowd, but the environment inside JerryWorld was electric for an SEC West showdown between Arkansas and Texas A&M. 68,113 saw an instant classic in the SouthWest Classic with A&M making a fourth quarter comeback. No matter how you feel about the pro team who calls it home, AT&T Stadium has become a great venue for some of college football’s best games. If you’ve never been, you have to get to a game there.
2. North Carolina State
It wasn’t the biggest crowd of the weekend, but it was likely the rowdiest. For the better part of three quarters, it looked as if N.C. State was going to knockoff the top-ranked team in the country, and all 57,583 in a sold out Carter-Finley Stadium were going nuts. It was a sea of red and the Seminoles nearly found its season wrecked in the Triangle.
3. Georgia
Sanford Stadium was the place to be on Saturday afternoon in the SEC. Georgia and Tennessee played a tight one on the field in front of 92,746 red and black-clad fans. The Vols have lost its last three meetings between the hedges. Apparently, it was a such a good atmosphere on Saturday that ESPN SEC reporter Edward Aschoff – covering the game – tweeted the following: “I’m sorry but UGA has the best in-game videos and soundtrack in the SEC. That’s just the truth.”
4. Oklahoma State
The Cowboys downed Texas Tech on Thursday night in front of an announced attendance of 55,958 at Boone Pickens Stadium. Long regarded as a hellish place to play in the Big 12, visiting teams are heckled by the Oklahoma State faithful, especially on the sidelines where there’s virtually no space between the field and the stands.
5. South Carolina
Once again, Williams-Brice Stadium proved itself as one of the premier venues in all of college football on Saturday night. The Gamecocks suffered a rare loss at home at night, where they’ve been virtually unbeatable the past three seasons. The defense gave a reason for the 83,493 South Carolina fans to jump up and down during Sandstorm for the first three and a half quarters, but Maty Mauk and the Missouri Tigers quieted them to a hush with two late touchdowns to steal a win.
After living in Birmingham, Ala., Jordan left the ground zero of SEC Nation to head south to Florida to tell the unique stories of the renowned tradition of SEC football. In his free time, his mission is to find the best locales around.
