Georgia fans spurn airline’s $3,000 offer to take later flight to big road game against Notre Dame

No. 15 Georgia is playing at No. 24 Notre Dame on Saturday for the first time since the Bulldogs defeated the Fighting Irish 17-10 in the 1981 Sugar Bowl. It’ll be the first regular-season meeting between the programs, and the first trip for the Bulldogs to South Bend, Ind.

The Georgia fan base is known to travel well and is excited for the trip up north. They were so eager to get there, in fact, that none was willing to give up their seat on a Friday morning flight and take a later flight — until the price was right.

A Delta Air Lines flight was scheduled to leave Atlanta for South Bend at 9:55 a.m. local time, but the flight was overbooked. Usually airlines offer travel vouchers to passengers to give up their seats, but Delta instead offered $2,200 to anyone who would give up their seat and take the next flight, scheduled to depart at 7 p.m.

No one took the offer, so Delta bumped it up.

Then some more.

And finally someone took the offer at $4,000.

This will be the farthest north Georgia has traveled since playing at Michigan in 1965.

Twitter: @edmgonzalez

eduardo.gonzalez@latimes.com