College Football Playoff home games have finally arrived, with Notre Dame Stadium, Beaver Stadium, Darrell K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium and Ohio Stadium set to host the first on-campus Playoff games ever. The atmospheres are sure to be memorable.
It got us thinking: What’s the loudest you’ve ever heard a college football team’s home stadium? It could be a play, a moment or a full game. The Athletic’s writers and editors weigh in here. Readers: Add yours below in the comments!
Pete Sampson: Tom Zbikowski’s 60-yard punt return against USC during the second quarter of the Bush Push game in 2005 remains the loudest I’ve heard Notre Dame Stadium in the past 25 years. This was before video boards or piped in music. It was just the pure delirium that comes when a fan base can hardly believe what it’s witnessing.
Zbikowski’s mazy run was hardly the blazing sprint you’d associate with elite speed. He broke tackles like a fullback more than he ran by defenders like a sprinter. It only added to the crescendo as the noise built with every stiff arm. Notre Dame ultimately lost a game so epic its nickname holds almost two decades later. But Zbikowski’s punt return still stands out as a moment Notre Dame Stadium was up for grabs.
Stewart Mandel: The loudest I’ve ever heard a stadium was in 2014 in Starkville, Miss., down on the field at the end of a No. 2 vs. No. 3 game between Dak Prescott-led Mississippi State and Auburn. Which may seem surprising given the Bulldogs play in a 60,000-seat stadium, but when all of Davis Wade Stadium clangs those cowbells at once, it is truly deafening. As much as any 100,000-seat place, especially when Mississippi State was about to become No. 1.
Mitch Light: David Wade Stadium at Mississippi State. It was November 2014, the week after the Bulldogs lost to Alabama and dropped from No. 1 in the College Football Playoff rankings. But they were still No. 4, and they dominated Vanderbilt 51-0 behind Prescott. The cowbells definitely play a factor in the noise level, but it was still an incredible environment, at night, with a very good Mississippi State team.
Joe Rexrode: Several scenes at several stadiums come to mind, including the multiplying roars greeting three straight sacks of Michigan quarterback Devin Gardner in 2013 at Michigan State’s Spartan Stadium. But a Jauan Jennings juggling catch and run for a touchdown against Florida in 2016 at Neyland Stadium stands out as the loudest single moment. The place shook. And it can generate overwhelming noise as effectively as any arena in the sport.
Matt Baker: I was on the sidelines for the final few minutes when Tennessee beat Florida in 2016. Between the roaring fans and the band blaring “Rocky Top,” it was the loudest non-motorsports moment I’ve heard in my life. Neyland Stadium is deafening on most days, but this was special. ESPN’s “College GameDay” was in town for a top-20 matchup of undefeated teams. The Vols had lost 11 in a row to their rivals, and Florida’s secondary talked trash leading up to kickoff. Tennessee fell behind 21-0 but rallied for a 38-28 win. It felt like 102,000 fans screamed away a dozen years of pent-up frustration as they celebrated a “We’re back!” moment.
Chris Vannini: 2023, Washington’s Husky Stadium, Oregon misses a game-tying field goal as time expires to give Washington a win in the first-ever top-10 matchup in the rivalry. The overhangs on both sidelines of that stadium really keep the noise directed toward the field. The crowd immediately stormed the field as well.
Christopher Kamrani: Apple Cup, 2023. Washington was at home playing rival Washington State with a shot to clinch a perfect regular season. The Huskies did not look the part of one of the best teams in the country for most of the day. Washington faced a fourth-and-1 at its own 29-yard line with the score tied 21-21 with 1:11 left. I was down on the field and on the Wazzu sideline. The Cougars felt like they were going to ruin a perfect season.
But Washington went for it on fourth down deep in its own territory and Rome Odunze ran for 23 yards to set up the eventual game-winning field goal. The noise hits you so much harder when you’re on the field compared to the stands or the press box. In that moment, Husky Stadium exploded and it was ear-piercing. It was awesome.
Eric Single: South Carolina’s love affair with Darude’s “Sandstorm” began during a Thursday night upset of No. 4 Ole Miss in September 2009. I was not at that game, but I was standing on a student section bleacher at Williams-Brice Stadium one month later during the Gamecocks’ 14-10 win over Vanderbilt, at the peak of the fan base’s belief that they had bottled home-field invincibility before a late-season three-game losing streak brought expectations back to earth.
Fifteen years later, “Sandstorm” at Williams-Brice includes more coordination and towel choreography. Back then, it was a more primal, instinctive rave atmosphere willing Stephen Garcia and company to victory, and standing motionless in the center of it all was a thrilling, moderately terrifying surrender to chaos.
Seth Emerson: South Carolina, 2012, when it played Georgia in a matchup of unbeaten teams. The press box was shaking before the game. Georgia was so intimidated and South Carolina so fired up that it was over at kickoff, with the home team racing out to a 21-0 lead en route to a 35-7 Gamecocks win.
Matt Brown: My favorite kind of loud moment might be when an enthusiastic crowd smells blood and a possible upset turns into an unexpected blowout. My best example was September 2002 at Penn State’s Beaver Stadium, in a rare prime-time game before White Outs became a thing. Nebraska had played for the national title the previous year. Penn State had back-to-back losing seasons.
The Nittany Lions were holding a 19-7 lead with six minutes left in the third quarter when Nebraska quarterback Jammal Lord, facing third-and-6, sailed a pass over his receiver’s head into the hands of Penn State cornerback Richard Gardner, who returned it 43 yards for a touchdown. What looked like a tight game turned into a 40-7 rout, and two years of frustration turned into elation in front of what stood as the largest Beaver Stadium crowd for 15 years.
Audrey Snyder: Penn State-Ohio State 2016 in Beaver Stadium. In the fourth quarter with less than 5 minutes remaining, Marcus Allen blocked Tyler Durbin’s field goal attempt. Cornerback Grant Haley scooped it up to return it 60 yards for the touchdown. That play put Penn State on the path to upsetting No. 2 Ohio State. The crowd was so loud as Haley approached the goal line, and the usual swaying of the press box that happens during key moments started while Haley was about 10 yards shy of the end zone. As soon as he scored, somehow that stadium hit another noise level that I didn’t think was possible. Penn State fans capped the night with a field storming.
Austin Meek: I was at the 2019 White Out game between Penn State and Michigan, and I don’t think I’ve ever been in a louder environment. Give Penn State fans 12 hours to get ready for a game and put them all in white, and they can get REALLY loud. I was standing right in front of the student section when Penn State stopped Michigan on fourth-and-goal to win and I think my ears are still ringing. Five years later, that’s still one of James Franklin’s best wins at Penn State.
Justin Williams: Nippert Stadium is smaller than most of the stadiums on this list, but the way the stadium is positioned allows it to get much louder than its 40,000 capacity would suggest. Hearing the crowd chant “C-F-P” as the clock ticked down during the 2021 AAC championship game that clinched Cincinnati’s spot in the four-team Playoff stands out, but the loudest I ever heard the place was a couple of years earlier. It was a 2019 Bearcats win over UCF that involved a then-unknown true freshman named Ahmad “Sauce” Gardner intercepting UCF quarterback Dillon Gabriel (!) for a tide-turning pick six.
But that wasn’t the loudest moment, either. It was a 60-yard run by Michael Warren II as the third-quarter ended. The way Warren broke multiple tackles and had a pair of UCF defenders pinballing into each other at the end created multiple crowd crescendos.
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Antonio Morales: USC quarterback Caleb Williams spinning out of the grasp of Notre Dame defenders to evade a sack and turning a play headed nowhere into a signature moment of his 2022 Heisman season stands out above the rest in my time covering Trojans games.
David Ubben: I would point to two moments: First would be LSU quarterback Garrett Nussmeier throwing touchdowns to tie Ole Miss and beat the Rebels in overtime earlier this season at a raucous Death Valley at night. The other would have been a variety of moments during Tennessee’s win over Alabama in 2022, perhaps either Jalin Hyatt’s long touchdown or the long completion before Chase McGrath’s game-winning kick for the Vols’ first victory over the Crimson Tide in 16 years.
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Kennington Smith III: Sept. 28, 2013: Aaron Murray hits Justin Scott-Wesley for a touchdown with 1:44 to play and No. 9 Georgia rallies to beat No. 6 LSU 44-41 in Sanford Stadium. I’m a Georgia alumnus, and Sanford Stadium hasn’t been louder but maybe one time since then — 2022 against Tennessee.
Ralph Russo: The first home game played by LSU in 2005 after hurricanes Katrina and Rita was played on a Monday night at Tiger Stadium. LSU went up 21-0 against Tennessee in the first half. Either the sack fumble on the first drive that set up a one-play TD drive or the pick six that made it 21-0 was the loudest I have ever heard a stadium. Unfortunately for LSU, all the early energy seemed to drain from the Tigers and Tennessee won 30-27 in OT.
Scott Dochterman: In 2010, Wisconsin and Iowa collided at Kinnick Stadium in the epic confrontation in their long rivalry. With the Hawkeyes leading 27-24 midway through the fourth quarter, Iowa safety Brett Greenwood intercepted Wisconsin quarterback Scott Tolzien to give Iowa the ball inside the Wisconsin 30. The collective eruption sounded like a sonic boom despite the largely soundproof press box. However, that euphoria was replaced with the loudest collective groan I’ve ever heard on Wisconsin’s next series when the Badgers converted on a fake punt.
Jesse Temple: I’ve covered some pretty memorable games at Camp Randall Stadium. But one that stands out a decade later is the 2014 game against Nebraska in which running back Melvin Gordon set the FBS single-game record (for one week) with 408 yards rushing in just three quarters. He was electric in a matchup of top-20 teams. As snow cascaded across the stadium, fans serenaded him with chants of “Mel-vin Gor-don.” Oklahoma’s Samaje Perine broke the record against Kansas the next week.
I’ll always wonder how many yards Gordon would have rushed for if he had been able to play the fourth quarter. With the way he was running, that record likely wouldn’t have been touched for some time.
Mitch Sherman: Colorado at Nebraska in 2008 when Ndamukong Suh intercepted Cody Hawkins in the final seconds and stiff-armed the Buffs’ QB en route to the end zone for a game-clinching pick six. Minutes earlier, Memorial Stadium had erupted when Nebraska kicker Alex Henery hit a 57-yard field goal to put the Huskers ahead. But the place came unglued as Suh put a stamp on the victory.
Cameron Teague Robinson: I have three probably all tied. The first is the entire game of Oregon’s win against Ohio State at Autzen Stadium. That was the loudest full game I’ve ever been to. As for one play, Ohio State safety Caleb Downs’ punt return against Indiana was the loudest I’ve heard Ohio Stadium in my time on the beat and is probably tied with when Cardinal Stadium erupted after Louisville beat UCF on a game-winning pick six in 2021. Both of those stadiums went wild after those plays.
Sam Khan Jr.: Texas A&M’s marathon 74-72 win against LSU in 2018 that went seven overtimes. I’ll never forget how loud Kyle Field got with 100,000-plus in the building, including more than 30,000 students screaming and waving towels constantly. Meanwhile, the LSU band played as loud as it possibly could for all seven of those overtimes. My ears are still ringing from that.
Kate Hairopoulos: Alabama was starting to look like it was going to pull off a win at home against Johnny Manziel and Texas A&M after all, and Bryant-Denny Stadium was thunderous in that open-air press box. It was A&M’s first year in the SEC (2012), and it was pretty eye-opening. It all added to the surreal environment when Manziel and the Aggies went to Tuscaloosa and won.
Brian Hamilton: It’s been a little under a decade since Clemson fans swarmed around their head football coach as he declared a win over Notre Dame was a “B.Y.O.G” game: Bring Your Own Guts, Dabo Swinney screamed in the direction of ESPN’s Holly Rowe. It’s funny (and depressing) to note that the Tigers were actually on the ascent as a program at that point, reached the peak of college football at the end of the following season and now have skidded in recent seasons to the point of almost missing the first 12-team Playoff entirely.
But on that early October night in 2015, when a late two-point conversion by Notre Dame failed, Memorial Stadium erupted. Everything was ahead of Clemson. Everyone seemed to know it and celebrated accordingly.
Grace Raynor: I’ve heard Clemson-Notre Dame in 2015 and Clemson-Louisville in 2016 were two of the greatest environments in Clemson history. But alas, I wasn’t covering the Tigers yet, so I’ll go with Clemson-Syracuse in 2018 at Death Valley. That was a wild day for the Tigers, who benched incumbent quarterback Kelly Bryant for freshman phenom Trevor Lawrence earlier in the week. Bryant left the program to transfer, then Lawrence was knocked out of the game before halftime with an injury.
That meant the Tigers needed to put the game into the hands of third-string quarterback Chase Brice, who teamed up with star running back Travis Etienne and top receiver Tee Higgins to mount a double-digit fourth quarter comeback. Brice linked up with Higgins for a 20-yard gain on fourth-and-6 that kept the Tigers’ drive alive before Clemson scored the game-winning touchdown a few moments later. That play will be remembered at Clemson for decades to come.
Manny Navarro: When Miami hosted Florida State at the old Orange Bowl in 2000 and beat the No. 1 Seminoles? That’s the loudest building I’ve ever been in.
Bruce Feldman: Loudest, craziest stadium I’ve ever been in was the old Orange Bowl. That place was a madhouse, at least for big games.
It was 2000. Miami was hosting No. 1 Florida State, the defending national champs riding a 17-game win streak. Bobby Bowden really had the Noles rolling, and Chris Weinke would go on to win the Heisman. Butch Davis had built back the Canes from hefty NCAA sanctions into a powerhouse. Although we knew Miami was really, really talented, I don’t think at that moment we had any clue just how loaded that team was until after that game.
Miami got out to a big lead. The Noles roared back and capitalized on a Najeh Davenport fumble to go up 24-20. But in the last minute of the game, Ken Dorsey led the Canes on a long drive before hitting Jeremy Shockey for the go-ahead touchdown with 40 seconds left. The Orange Bowl erupted. Being down on the sideline at that time, it felt like the entire place was going to collapse — and considering how shaky that structure was by that point, that’s not really hyperbole.
FSU was able to get the ball back downfield to set up Matt Munyon for a 49-yard field goal with five seconds left to tie. The energy in the place at that moment was different than any other Miami-FSU game I’d been at. The Noles already had a soul-crushing history against the Canes with game-losing missed field goals. And then they got one more. After Munyon’s attempt sailed wide right — Wide Right III in the rivalry — the old Orange Bowl went bananas.
Maybe it was because people down there knew how the Canes had collapsed from the previous decade. I think being down there that day and in that atmosphere is part of why I ended up writing my book “Cane Mutiny.” It was just a very different vibe than what I’ve experienced anywhere else in college football. Since then, I’ve been at a lot of wild scenes from Tiger Stadium in Baton Rouge to Tuscaloosa to Happy Valley over the years. Tiger Stadium’s probably the closest thing to it, but it still isn’t quite like that. When Miami was rolling, the old Orange Bowl just had a different kind of edge to it.
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(Photo: Randy Litzinger / Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)