Tennessee and Nebraska’s Music City Bowl match-up this year ranks as one of the most-attended bowl games during this bowl season. The announced sell-out crowd of 68,496 at Nissan Stadium ranks as the fourth-highest attendance at a bowl game this season, including the two playoff games so far.
According to FootballSchedules.com, the Music City Bowl ranked just behind the Fiesta (71,279), Peach (75,996) and Rose Bowl (95,128) as the most-attended bowls this winter. The sell-out crowd for the 2016 Music City Bowl was also the second-largest increase in attendance for a bowl game from the previous year among non-playoff bowls. Last year’s Louisville vs. Texas A&M match-up saw 50,478 fans show up. Only the Heart of Dallas Bowl between Army and North Texas saw a bigger increase from the previous year.
Music City Bowl officials confirmed this year’s attendance was the third-highest total in Music City Bowl history. The Music City Bowl has been a bowl since 1998.
This year’s Music City Bowl also had the fourth-highest “fill rate” according to FootballSchedules.com. The Music City bowl was at 101.2% capacity, and only the Peach (102.4%), Rose (102.8%), and Orange (103.2%) had higher fill rates.
While Nebraska fans showed up well for the Music City Bowl, Tennessee fans still dominated the stands and made up the majority of the fans in Nashville. Vol fans have shown up year-round to see Tennessee play, too.
Neyland Stadium saw two announced sellouts and averaged 100,967 fans in attendance, the highest total since 2008 (101,448). Throw in the record-setting total of 156,990 that attended the Battle at Bristol, which also appeared to have more Vol fans than Virginia Tech fans, and Tennessee fans made their presence felt all season long.
