OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — When No. 3 Oklahoma travels to Stillwater to face 11th-ranked Oklahoma State in this football-crazed state, there will be more than 10,000 empty seats in the school’s newly renovated stadium.

It’s not for a lack of interest. Both schools have set attendance records this season, and this will be one of the most anticipated games in the Bedlam rivalry’s 104-year history that predates statehood. It’s even the featured prime time game on national television Saturday night.

The vacant seats are the result of a policy announced in January in which tickets to the annual rivalry game would only be made available through the purchase of a season-ticket package.

Capacity at the newly renovated Boone Pickens Stadium is about 60,000, and OSU has sold slightly less than 40,000 season tickets this year, 8,000 more than last year and a new record for the school.

But with a national television audience watching a game that has national and Big 12 title implications, the athletic department is coming under fire from some for its decision not to allow the sale of single game tickets to the Bedlam matchup.

“Empty seats are empty seats,” the Tulsa World noted in an editorial Wednesday. “It’s a potentially embarrassing situation that would not happen in any other major football conference.”

The editorial encouraged OSU to give away the unused tickets to needy children or Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans.

Kevin Klintworth, a spokesman for OSU’s athletic department, said the school has no such plans and that the policy was established to increase the value to OSU season ticket holders.

“We were willing to stand up to a little criticism because we know this is in the long-term interest of our athletic programs,” Klintworth said. “It’s important for all of our athletic teams to grow our season ticket base.”

Consider that Oklahoma State is trying to keep up with a Sooners program just down Interstate 35 that has sold out its season-ticket base at an 82,000-seat stadium and has a waiting list that fluctuates around 24,000 people — 8,000 requests for an average of three seats each. That creates a big financial advantage.

Klintworth was quick to point out the policy was not intended to keep Oklahoma fans from making the 80-mile drive from Norman to attend the game, and that OSU made 5,000 tickets available to Sooners fans, 1,000 more than required by its contract.

“The 2008 Bedlam ticket policy isn’t really about 2008; it’s about growing our season-ticket base long term,” Klintworth said. “It’s a matter of putting some value in a season ticket.”

Season ticket packages at OSU begin at $245, with a four-ticket minimum, to an individual season ticket beginning at $419, Klintworth said.

But the policy seems to have rankled Sooners fans the most, since many of them are being forced either to buy an entire season ticket package just to attend one game or turn to ticket brokers, where prices range from $167 to more than $1,000.

“What bothers me the most is that they’re doing it because they’re scared of OU,” said OU fan Ryan Dragg, who lives in Norman. “They know if they release those single-game tickets, two-thirds of them will be purchased by OU fans, and that’s the last thing they want.”