Gary Laney column: Saturday is a win-win deal
for everybody (8/30)
By GARY LANEY
AMERICAN PRESS
One thing I've learned from watching the days leading up to
Saturday's McNeese State-Grambling game is that everybody
seems to be ready for these games but the administrations.
McNeese has known all summer that this game was going to sell out. Yet, it seems like half the
town is expecting the handling of the SRO crowd to be a problem.
The 6:45 p.m. sale time for standing-room only tickets seems like an ill-conceived idea. If they expect
to sell more than 1,000 tickets for the north hill, it seems unlikely that everybody will get in by kickoff.
And what about the people that are going to get in line early in the afternoon hoping to get in? Some
may be in line for hours, only to find out they can't get in because standing room has reached its
limit.
McNeese officials say it has worked before in games like 1995's Youngstown State game and the
1998 Southeast Oklahoma game (the Cecil Collins debut).
So you have to give it the benefit of the doubt and wait and see.
The significance is that this is it's first game against one of the state's historically black schools.
This gives the university an experience to draw upon for future reference.
Grambling, however, is more of a mystery to me.
Obviously, this game has drawn quite a bit of interest in north Lake Charles. The band alone is
drawing such a huge following that the parade scheduled for Saturday afternoon featuring the
Grambling band already is looking more like a homecoming event than a cameo appearance by a
visiting band.
Georgie Porgie's T-shirts on Mill Street, which is located on the parade route, is printing unofficial
T-shirts commemorating the game as "The Battle on the Lake" and the "Meeting in the Hole." The
proprietors expect them to sell fast and there might not be any left to sell at the tailgate parties.
This is huge for local Grambling fans. Yet, Tigers head coach Doug Williams told me Tuesday that he
thought this game was bigger for McNeese. He said that the north Lake Charles crowd that's going
to come out in droves to see the G-Men Saturday should be making more of an effort to go to
Grambling home games.
"We need to see banners in the stadium that say they are Grambling's Lake Charles rooting
session,'' he said.
He has a point. Grambling alums should support their school. They don't draw as well in their own
home as they do in "Classics" played at neutral sites and, as traveling gets more expensive,
Grambling will need home games in the future to cut cost.
Williams' public opinion that Grambling should not pursue a long-term rivalry with McNeese puzzles
me. I understand his desire to keep rivalries between historically black schools alive. But this is the
21st century and with it comes 21st-century problems.
The Tigers may be able to draw 50,000 people in New York to play Hampton. But those 50,000 will
not be the ones that are later going to come to Eddie Robinson Stadium to see a home game.
By playing McNeese, Grambling is able to reconnect with its fan base in south Louisiana. After
Saturday, there is a better chance that Williams will see that Lake Charles banner in Grambling than
before.
Grambling has a statewide fan base it can tap into. It would be wise if in the future the Tigers play
road games at places such as Hammond, Lafayette, Thibodaux and Lake Charles to help connect to
those fans.
It's a win-win situation for Grambling. By playing on the road, Grambling can help another state
school get a great crowd, and the Tigers can connect with their out-of-town fan base much the
way Skip Bertman did when he took LSU's baseball team on the road to face in-state rivals.
I would propose to Grambling, Southern, McNeese and Northwestern State that they find a way to
sign a joint contract where Grambling and Northwestern would play a home-and-home over two
years while McNeese and Southern play for two years. After that, they switch for the next two
years, with the Cowboys playing Grambling and Southern playing Northwestern.
If you can establish a long-term deal, then McNeese could seriously look at expanding its stadium to
accommodate future crowds it knows it's going to get. Grambling and Southern could be making
plans to bi-annual events to have alumni events in places such as Shreveport and Lake Charles, all
while drawing crowds at home, without the neutral-site expense.
The time has come for these rivalries to expand. The administrations need to get together and take
that next step.
for everybody (8/30)
By GARY LANEY
AMERICAN PRESS
One thing I've learned from watching the days leading up to
Saturday's McNeese State-Grambling game is that everybody
seems to be ready for these games but the administrations.
McNeese has known all summer that this game was going to sell out. Yet, it seems like half the
town is expecting the handling of the SRO crowd to be a problem.
The 6:45 p.m. sale time for standing-room only tickets seems like an ill-conceived idea. If they expect
to sell more than 1,000 tickets for the north hill, it seems unlikely that everybody will get in by kickoff.
And what about the people that are going to get in line early in the afternoon hoping to get in? Some
may be in line for hours, only to find out they can't get in because standing room has reached its
limit.
McNeese officials say it has worked before in games like 1995's Youngstown State game and the
1998 Southeast Oklahoma game (the Cecil Collins debut).
So you have to give it the benefit of the doubt and wait and see.
The significance is that this is it's first game against one of the state's historically black schools.
This gives the university an experience to draw upon for future reference.
Grambling, however, is more of a mystery to me.
Obviously, this game has drawn quite a bit of interest in north Lake Charles. The band alone is
drawing such a huge following that the parade scheduled for Saturday afternoon featuring the
Grambling band already is looking more like a homecoming event than a cameo appearance by a
visiting band.
Georgie Porgie's T-shirts on Mill Street, which is located on the parade route, is printing unofficial
T-shirts commemorating the game as "The Battle on the Lake" and the "Meeting in the Hole." The
proprietors expect them to sell fast and there might not be any left to sell at the tailgate parties.
This is huge for local Grambling fans. Yet, Tigers head coach Doug Williams told me Tuesday that he
thought this game was bigger for McNeese. He said that the north Lake Charles crowd that's going
to come out in droves to see the G-Men Saturday should be making more of an effort to go to
Grambling home games.
"We need to see banners in the stadium that say they are Grambling's Lake Charles rooting
session,'' he said.
He has a point. Grambling alums should support their school. They don't draw as well in their own
home as they do in "Classics" played at neutral sites and, as traveling gets more expensive,
Grambling will need home games in the future to cut cost.
Williams' public opinion that Grambling should not pursue a long-term rivalry with McNeese puzzles
me. I understand his desire to keep rivalries between historically black schools alive. But this is the
21st century and with it comes 21st-century problems.
The Tigers may be able to draw 50,000 people in New York to play Hampton. But those 50,000 will
not be the ones that are later going to come to Eddie Robinson Stadium to see a home game.
By playing McNeese, Grambling is able to reconnect with its fan base in south Louisiana. After
Saturday, there is a better chance that Williams will see that Lake Charles banner in Grambling than
before.
Grambling has a statewide fan base it can tap into. It would be wise if in the future the Tigers play
road games at places such as Hammond, Lafayette, Thibodaux and Lake Charles to help connect to
those fans.
It's a win-win situation for Grambling. By playing on the road, Grambling can help another state
school get a great crowd, and the Tigers can connect with their out-of-town fan base much the
way Skip Bertman did when he took LSU's baseball team on the road to face in-state rivals.
I would propose to Grambling, Southern, McNeese and Northwestern State that they find a way to
sign a joint contract where Grambling and Northwestern would play a home-and-home over two
years while McNeese and Southern play for two years. After that, they switch for the next two
years, with the Cowboys playing Grambling and Southern playing Northwestern.
If you can establish a long-term deal, then McNeese could seriously look at expanding its stadium to
accommodate future crowds it knows it's going to get. Grambling and Southern could be making
plans to bi-annual events to have alumni events in places such as Shreveport and Lake Charles, all
while drawing crowds at home, without the neutral-site expense.
The time has come for these rivalries to expand. The administrations need to get together and take
that next step.
