No CommentsThis morning ESPN and Bitpay announced that this year’s NCAA St. Petersburg Bowl has been renamed to the Bitcoin St. Petersburg Bowl after a high-profile sponsorship from Bitpay that will involve not only renaming this year’s bowl game but also allowing NCAA fans to purchase tickets for the game using Bitcoin via Bitpay.
The name change is effective immediately and will result in this year’s game on December 26th running under the new name and the name remaining the same through 2016.
“Our goal is to continue to move bitcoin into the mainstream and sponsoring the St. Petersburg Bowl offers us that opportunity,” said Tony Gallippi, Executive Chairman for BitPay. “College football fans and the bitcoin community represent a similar target demographic – tech-savvy men between the ages of 18 and 40.”
By sponsoring the bowl game, BitPay is not only hoping to stimulate the bitcoin community around the event, but also to further promote interest in the digital currency on a national scale. The bowl game will be an exciting opportunity to enable fans to use bitcoin in a fun, collegiate sports environment. With a rapport of over 33,000 merchants and growing, BitPay has led the bitcoin economy by allowing businesses around the world to easily accept bitcoin. The attention brought to bitcoin by the game will only further boost its ascension into the mainstream.
“We’re extremely excited to welcome BitPay to college football and our bowl home in St. Petersburg,” said Brett Dulaney, Executive Director of the Bitcoin St. Petersburg Bowl. “We look forward to a long and mutually beneficial arrangement.”
The 2014 game will be played on Friday, Dec. 26, at 8 p.m. ET at Tropicana Field in St. Petersburg. The game, which will once again air on ESPN, is in its first-year of its new conference affiliation with the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) and the American Athletic Conference.
Tickets for the 2014 Bitcoin St. Petersburg Bowl will go on sale later this year with prices starting as low as just $40. Tickets will be available through Ticketmaster or by phone at 1-800-745-3000. Tickets and merchandise will also be available to purchase with bitcoin.
While details have been sparse regarding official merchandise, in stadium purchases and other items being purchasable with Bitcoin it is likely over the next coming months that more details will be made avaliable.
