Re: Cajundome Renovations 2016
A few of points about the Cajun Dome being too big for UL.
The Cajun Dome broke ground in January 1982. That is a long, long time ago. ESPN had just launched in September of 1979. In those days you got a few televised games on major networks on Saturday afternoons. People more or less had to go to games then, and basketball was much more popular in those days, and a cheaper alternative. Bottom line when the dome was envisioned there was little competition, and we were used to much more vocal and enthusiastic crowds, after all Andrew Toney had just finished his time here in 1980. That was a short period of time before the plans were finalized.
The parish took up the cost of building it, and it had to be a huge multi functional building to make it attractive enough for the parish.
In 1980 many if not most UL fans thought the sky was the limit, the city and parish was entering into a vibrant growth phase. We were used to filling a shoddy Blackham, surely more fans would rush to see our great teams in a bright new shiny state of the art facility. It was the right decision based on the known variables of the time to build something we could grow into.
In that era big venues were opening everywhere, LSU, Tennessee, come to mind along with many others, even UNO got a 9600 seat area on the lakefront.
ESPN took over weeknights, and we got basketball non stop, conferences members got rich and teams refused to visit UL as they one did. Our young president refused to do the things that we needed to grow the programs, any of them.
We now have the biggest facility in the SBC, and probably many conferences. We cannot change ESPN, and other media so we will never have the market to ourselves as we once did. Going to the dome isn't a cheap night out with the family, but neither is a movie.
The two things we can do are to be sure we always get an outstanding coach, and winning two thirds of your SBC games isn't outstanding.
We need to with all haste implement the Alden recommendations and be positioning ourselves for a better conference. We need to woe, and court these conferences daily. If your AD isn't up to that task you've got the wrong AD.
Quote
Originally Posted by CajunAmos
