Boston College Football Week 1 Poll: Northwestern Game

Much like last season, on Thursdays during the football season, we'll throw a quick poll up concerning the Eagles upcoming opponent.

On Saturday, or, in TWO DAYS, the Boston College Eagles will host the Northwestern Wildcats at Alumni Stadium. Kickoff is at noon. Much has been made about the recent BC football attendance issues, all because the AD teamed up with GroupOn to offer discounted tickets to the NU game. But what will attendance be like on Saturday?

Perhaps history can be a guide here. There have been 16 home openers on the Heights since Alumni Stadium was last renovated in 1995. Just four of those games sold out -- Michigan in 1995, Virginia Tech in 1996, Penn State in 2004 and Clemson in 2006. The four home openers with the lowest attendance over that time are Rutgers in 1998 (38,287 ... Big East conference games FTW), Weber State in 2010 (34,168), Baylor in 1999 (33,756) and Northeastern in 2009 (33,262), now defunct.

The average per-game attendance for a home opener from 1995-2010 is 40,437. BC has opened with a BCS nonconference opponent just four times over that time span -- in 1995 (Michigan), 1999 (Baylor), 2003 (Wake Forest) and 2004 (Penn State). Two sold out games, a well attended game against Wake Forest in 2003 (42,563) and an attendance bust in the 1999 Baylor game.

Clearly Northwestern is no Michigan or Penn State when it comes to college football cache, but they aren't exactly Rutgers, Weber State or Northeastern, either.

This all leads me to this week's question: what will be the listed attendance for Saturday's game against Northwestern? Vote and feel free to discuss the game and the question in the comment sections below.

Go Eagles!