STATE COLLEGE, Pa. -- Courtney Maholtz laughed when her fiance Chad suggested they get married in the parking lot outside Beaver Stadium before a Penn State football game. She must be a keeper, though, because he managed to talk her into tailgating for the reception.
The Maholtzs were married Friday night at the Eisenhower Chapel on Penn State's campus. On Saturday, they drove Chad's blue-and-white RV on the same four-mile trek it makes most Saturdays in the fall. This time they packed a wedding cake and invited a band to join them. Somewhere in the neighborhood of 150 friends and family joined the party, but Chad was happy to be part of a bigger crowd.
"We couldn't think of a better place to do it," he said. "We're celebrating with 107,000 of our closest friends and family."
Maholtz graduated from Penn State in 1993 and has been attending Nittany Lions games since the '70s. His new bride is a State College native and has been at Chad's side at every football, basketball and hockey game Penn State has played for the past several years. She said she wasn't quite sure how her family would react when she mentioned their reception idea, but they immediately loved it.
"This is just perfectly fitting for us," she said, wearing a veil and a tiara with a Nittany Lions logo in the center. "We're definitely unique."
The honeymoon, of course, will have to wait until football season finishes. They are planning to head to the Caribbean, but Chad has plans to work in a stop along the way to the bowl game where Penn State lands.