.Northern Illinois stunned No. 5 Notre Dame last weekend break on a last-second field goal to notch college football's very first big distress of 2024. For the Huskies, it is actually a gain they'll be commemorating for years to follow. For the Battling Irish, it's a season-crusher. To drop the home opener to a small school coming from a vastly substandard conference was an awkwardness for Notre Dame.Especially due to the fact that they paid out NIU $1.4 million to carry out it.This shines a lighting on one of the longest and very most expensive customs in university volleyball: guarantee games. They're likewise contacted "amount of money games," "paycheck video games," or even, as I like to phone all of them, "buy full weeks." An expensive (and unsafe) traditionFor years, in the 1st handful of full weeks of the time, major college soccer establishments have actually paid for much smaller universities to follow to play them in their house.In Week 1 alone, much more than $35 million was actually devoted throughout a minimum of 55 assurance video games, according to Front end Workplace Athletics. Alabama composed the greatest check to its own enemy, Western Kentucky, for a monstrous $1.9 million. WKU shed that game 63-- 0, but they perhaps reached the rely on the bus experience home and likely will not reconsider it.In Full week 2, 3 colleges-- Western Michigan, Middle Tennessee, and Utah State-- got payments larger than NIU's $1.4 million. They dropped through a combined score of 156-- 3, however they take away a total of $4.85 thousand in the process.It's commonly a bargain for both staffs. The small institutions receive an income, the large institutions receive yet another home game to dairy gameday revenue. The little school comes to play on the large stage and acquire nationwide direct exposure, the huge one receives a cupcake on the routine to begin the year in a sporting activity without any preseason. Thus all's effectively as well as really good up until the smaller team makes a decision to show out as well as pull the distress.