We are a day away from the Louisiana Ragin’ Cajun’s football team hosting the Sun Belt Championship game in Lafayette. The Cajuns will be taking on Marshall, and competing to win their 4th Sun Belt title. It’s been a very fun year.
The University of Louisiana has been slowly but surely stepping up its own game with fan engagement. This whole season has been an improvement over last season, which was an improvement over the season before. In case you missed it, the latest promotion announced is that students will receive a $10 concession stand voucher in the 3rd quarter. Now I tell you, when I was a poor student that sort of promotion would have made my night because I probably did not have much to look forward to for dinner.
The student engagement has been great, and now the school needs to keep ramping up the city engagement. Hopefully we will set an attendance record this weekend, and the school can take notes on what works and what flopped. City engagement I believe we have seen improve this year—but that forward progress must continue. I believe this is the weekend that planning needs to start for next year.
Promoting a game is not solely the school’s job, it should be other fans’ jobs as well. I’ve done a fair bit of social media and office promotion myself, but I’m just one voice. Luckily, a small community of fans have been taking a stronger lead (in my opinion) in promoting the game than the University has. This community, centered around the podcast Ragin Review, has been yelling from their rooftop for years to try and get the school to make a move. And it finally seems that the school is starting to listen, as stated above.
Well, partially. One big thing that this community and others have been asking everyone we can is “Why don’t we have a mascot?” An old friend of mine from my time at UL has even taken up the initiative to create a new mascot idea, with different characteristics, color schemes, etc. This spirit leader is Albineaux, an albino alligator, created by Cory Stewart. Hopefully the University will start believing in Al (or any other mascot really) and make it a fixture at games, school life, community engagement, and more.
Usually, the best thing to do to draw a crowd is winning. Louisiana Ragin Cajuns have done that very well over the last 10-13 years, but attendance and awareness is still below where it should be. So besides more promotions from the school, what else can we do to drive attendance and engagement? It’s very simple-bring your friends. If you’re friends with UL alumni who choose to skip the game (especially to watch another school), then you need to shake some sense into them and bring them to the game. Tickets at Cajun Field are cheaper than an ESPN+ subscription or tickets to the other school in Baton Rouge (who is NOT playing for a conference championship anyway).
Time to make your plans, buy some jackets for the kids, order tickets online, and get ready to Pack Cajun Field. Drag your friends along. Shame or shun the ones that pushback on attending. Experiences like the Sun Belt Championship game give kids and new fans something to look forward to next season. It’s going to be a blast!
Bayou Observant 