Gameday completely different with Green Bay fans in the stands

Limited amount of Packers’ fans still make big difference

One of the advantages of earning home-field advantage in the NFL is that teams then get to play high stakes playoff games in front of their own fans.

In the year of the coronavirus pandemic, that luxury was eliminated, as crowds around the league have been limited or completely eliminated.

After hosting a few hundred fans over the final few regular season home games, the Green Bay Packers announced they would sell approximately 6,000 tickets for the divisional round playoff game against the Los Angeles. After adding in some front-line health care workers, first responders and special guests, there were over 8,000 spectators watching.

While that number pales in comparison to the nearly 80,000 fans that attended the Packers-Seahawks playoff game a year ago, the green and gold faithful still made a difference in helping the Packers top the Rams.

While the scene outside Lambeau Field looked similar to what home games all year have — with no fans tailgating — the sights and sounds changed as you approached the stadium.

Instead of seeing just a few police officers on the way to the health screening tent, I had to weave my way through fans decked in green and gold. On the way up to the press box, the usually quiet concourse inside Lambeau was filled with excited fans making their way to their their seats.

As the stadium began to fill, you could feel the energy building, and it only kept increasing as the game moved along.

The first thing Green Bay coach Matt LaFleur talked about in his opening statement to the media after the win was regarding the fans.

“I just wanted to start out and say how appreciative we are of the fans that showed up tonight,” said LaFleur. “That definitely made a big difference. I think our guys really fed off their energy.”

From the “Go Pack Go” chants to banging signs on the mostly empty bleachers, Lambeau Field had an energy that was missing since that playoff game against the Seahawks.

After a few standout plays from quarterback Aaron Rodgers, fans serenaded the veteran player with “MVP” chants.

“Talk about just pure joy running down that tunnel,” said Rodgers after the game. “You know we’ve had a few hundred (fans) for a couple games, but it felt like 50,000 when we ran out of the tunnel, it really did. It was such a special moment.

“I forgot how much I truly, truly miss having a crowd there, and obviously that wasn’t a normal crowd like last year with a Seattle type of crowd. It felt like 50, 60,000, it really did. It’s hard to put into words how special that feeling is, but you can feel it. It’s just so palpable. You can feel the energy in the stadium. It’s just different. It’s different playing in front of a crowd, it really is. It’s just a little more special and obviously more sweet.”

While fans could have easily sat the entire game with how much space was in between every group of fans, most were on their feet the entire game.

The stadium was as quiet as it had been all year when the Packers were on offense, but for the first time, you could tell when a big play happened on offense after the roar from the crowd.

When the Rams’ offense took the field, Lambeau Field came alive to make life tough on the visitors. The crowd was especially rocking late in the third and fourth quarters when the Packers’ defense was trying to hold on to the team’s lead.

“It felt like 90,000 honestly,” said receiver Allen Lazard. “The fans (being) there was huge. For me, just to be able to see more than a couple hundred people for the first time in I don’t know how long, was a cool experience.

“Just to be able to feed off their energy was huge and I think that played a huge role in our win today. We’re looking forward to those guys coming back out and doing the same thing next week because we’re going to need them for sure.”

A day after the win, the Packers announced that an additional 500 tickets would go on sale for the NFC Championship Game. Along with those 6,500 tickets, more front-line workers, first responders and special guests will be on hand to try and cheer the Packers past the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and to the Super Bowl.

Morgan Rode is the sports editor for NEW Media. Readers can contact him at sports@newmedia-wi.com.