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Irish mates sneaked into Super Bowl, sat in $30,000 seats

Eric Edholm | Shutdown Corner
Irish guys snuck into Super Bowl, sat in $30,000 seats

Upper-deck tickets for Super Bowl XLIX rose to more than US$10,000 by gameday. But two Seattle Seahawks fans from Ireland sneaked into the game and sat in lower-bowl seats valued at US$25,000 - for free!

The Irish fans, Paul McEvoy and Richard Whelan, couldn't afford tickets to the game at University of Phoenix Stadium between their beloved Seahawks and the New England Patriots. So they decided to walk through the front door.

First, they tried to grovel for tickets while being interviewed on NFL Network, but to no avail. They they found their way in illegally.

"Our game plan was to be super confident," Whelan told RTE Radio One Morning Ireland, via The Independent. "We just thought if we pretend we belong there, nobody will question us. Between one layer of security and another we just walked in behind these 20 first aid workers, straight up to the front door and hid in behind them.

"Paul was looking at his phone, pretending to text me, as if we had just popped out to look at an email we got or something. We walked past another security guard that just wasn't paying attention. We could see the field then, the stadium and the atmosphere was insane."

Once inside, Richard sent out this tweet.

They walked around the stadium, careful not to look back in case they were followed.

"I remember looking at Paul's face, we just couldn't believe we got in," Whelan said.

They seat-hopped for a while, taking people's places while they went to the bathroom or for concessions, before settling in lower-bowl seats of two girls who were part of the halftime show, they learned.

In a hilarious coincidence, they ended up sitting next to former Patriots and Seahawks safety Lawyer Milloy, who gave them a play-by-play of the action.

"It was pretty cool to have the Super Bowl champion sharing all the details," Whelan said.

Yes, Irish eyes were smiling.

It will be a long trip back to Dublin, but Whelan said the experience was well worth it.

"It was a good day of hustling," Whelan said. "What seemed like impossible came true."

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