On Astrojacks and Watching Games You Don't Understand

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First, let me share some very important space oxen related news

Last August, I wrote about a unique new marketing campaign out of Northern Arizona. Typically, NAU athletics uses the “Lumberjacks” mascot. But for a few games across multiple teams, the program would temporarily rebrand as the Astrojacks. Goodbye, Louie the Lumberjack. Hello, Blouie the Space Ox.

The rebrand isn’t just because the idea of sending an ox to space is super cool. It’s also a shoutout to Flagstaff’s rich history in space research. The city is the home of Lowell Observatory, was designated as the first “Dark Sky City”, and was where Pluto was discovered.

Now, NAU’s men’s basketball team is about to wear the uniforms for the first time. An industry source shared the following images with me:

https://x.com/MattBrownEP/status/1891526700464226789

Pretty cool, huh?

If you want to buy your own little slice of college sports space history, you can buy stuff with the space ox on it. The school is actually auctioning off some game-worn uniforms, starting at just $75 bucks, right here. One could also buy Astrojacks Gear here, or via the university bookstore.

Like I wrote back in August, I think these kinds of rebrands are awesome. Between the auctions and the university bookstore, sure, the program stands to earn a little extra money in licensing fees and moving more t-shirts and hats. But it’s also a chance for the university to tell the story of the school, and the surrounding community, in a new way. It’s goofy. There’s a little minor league baseball element in there. But so what?

I look forward to hearing about other unique uniform rebrands schools cook up. I hope Blouie the Space Ox inspires other schools to figure out a unique hook to celebrate about what makes their program, campus, and community, special.

Which reminds me, I want to talk about the Lake Show real quick

I’d like to think that running this newsletter for the last few years has helped me build a good knowledge base of the college sports industry. But there are a lot of individual sports that I freely admit…I don’t know all that much about.

Lacrosse is one of those sports. When I lived about a mile away from the University of Maryland, I attended a few Terrapin men’s lacrosse games, but I never covered the sport or engaged with it on a deeper level. I had never been to a women’s lacrosse game before.

But last week, the folks at Northwestern reached out and asked if I’d like to bring my whole family to watch the #2 Northwestern Wildcats take on the top-ranked team in the country, Boston College. I happily accepted.

I loaded everybody up in snowpants and threw extra blankets in the car, completely forgetting that Northwestern actually plays inside for the first chunk of their season, in the Ryan Fieldhouse. While I had typically associated the building as one just used for football practices, it can hold thousands of people in bleacher seating to accommodate a big lacrosse game…with video boards, purple smoke, and a massive view of the (frozen) Lake Michigan.

Was I able to explain the finer points of lacrosse strategy to my children? Absolutely not. Did I always understand exactly what was happening on any particular play? I sure didn’t. But did we all have a ton of fun? YES….even my two daughters, who are normally, at best, apathetic to any sporting event that doesn’t involve Mario.

I think that’s because you don’t need a degree in sports management to understand drama, passion, and athleticism. The fieldhouse was just about at capacity, and even my ten-year-old was enthralled with Northwestern’s efforts to climb out of an early four-goal deficit. She understood the point of the game was to put the ball in the net, she understood how strong and fast the women were on the field, and she understood wanting to scream with a bunch of strangers.

I don’t know about any of you industry professional types, but after writing about college sports for my job for the last 13ish years, it can be hard for me to just sit back and watch a game. My brain starts trying to figure out how I’d write about it, what the narratives are….and increasingly, I find myself noticing stuff like scoreboard sponsorship activations or luxury seating. If I’m not careful, the whole thing can feel like work.

But I couldn’t really do that for a women’s lacrosse game, because I don’t know the sport well enough. But I could scream and clap and holler with everybody else, and try to let myself and my family get carried up in the moment.

Northwestern fought back gamely, but Boston College pulled away late to win, 13-9, in a game they never trailed. After the final horn, my oldest turned to me and said, “I’ve never felt this way about sports before, but I really wanted the Wildcats to come back and win. When can we go to another game?” My six-year-old agreed. Nobody complained about a lack of Nintendo Switch time for hours.

Do you realize how hard that is to do?!?!?

The Wildcats have another home game this Friday against Colorado. I’m debating if I want to take them there, or maybe catch a basketball game before the regular season ends.

If you are lucky enough to live near a college…why not see who is playing this weekend? Go watch a sport you don’t know very much about. Go watch a softball game. Check out lacrosse. See if the club hockey team is still playing. Don’t overthink it. Just grab a pretzel and a beverage and go clap and scream like an idiot.

I think you’ll have a good time. I know we sure did.

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