January 13, 2015
The Indianapolis Colts will head to New England this weekend to take on the Patriots in the AFC Championship game. It's the third time in Tom Brady's career that he has faced off against the Colts in the AFC Championship game and the first time he'll be up against Andrew Luck.
[embedit cf="HTML1"]
Last week, the Colts knocked off the Broncos as Luck defeated his predecessor, Peyton Manning, 24-13 in the Divisional Round. Luck threw for 265 yards on 27-of-43 passing, had two touchdowns and two interceptions. Despite not throwing an interception, Manning's stat line was not as impressive as Luck. Manning had 211 passing yards, completing 26-of-46 passed and throwing for one touchdown.
The Patriots took care of the Ravens in a nailbiter in New England. Despite four touchdown passes from Joe Flacco and a 28-14 lead in the third quarter, it wasn't enough for Baltimore to knock off the Patriots again. New England would outscore the Ravens 21-3 in the final quarter and a half of the game to advance to the AFC Championship game.
It won't be an easy task for the Colts to knock off the Patriots. The good news for the Colts? The only other team to knock off Peyton Manning and Tom Brady in the same season were the 2012 Baltimore Ravens, the eventual Super Bowl champs.
Back in November, the Colts lost 42-20 to New England despite 303 passing yards and two touchdown passes from Luck. But the day belonged to Jonas Gray. Gray annihilated the Colts' defense, rushing for 201 yards and four touchdowns for the Patriots. Gray, who missed last week's Divisional Round game due to injury, has not been cleared for this week's game.
| YEAR | MATCH-UP | AVG PRICE | GET-IN PRICE |
| 2010 | Jets at Colts | $342.90 | $172 |
| 2011 | Jets at Steelers | $532.94 | $247 |
| 2012 | Ravens at Patriots | $514.29 | $184 |
| 2013 | Ravens at Patriots | $530.78 | $199 |
| 2014 | Patriots at Broncos | $740.13 | $221 |
| 2015 | Colts at Patriots | $569.17 | $218 |
Tickets for this year's game stopped a five-year trend of steadily increasing ticket prices. The last time the Colts made the AFC Championship game (2010 at home vs. the Jets), tickets cost $342.90 on average on the secondary ticket market, the least expensive in the last five seasons. A year later, tickets for Jets at Steelers skyrocketed to $532.94 on average, a 36 percent increase. The next two seasons were Ravens at Patriots matchups, last week's Divisional Round matchup and cost $514.29 and $530.78 respectively on the secondary ticket market.
The get-in prices for the last five AFC Championship games follows the same trend, as well, peaking at $221 in 2014 with the least expensive ticket costing $172 in 2010. Fans can expect to pay $218 to get-in to this year's game which will decide the AFC representative for Super Bowl XLIX.
