On any level of sports entertainment, collegiate football is unmatched in crowd engagement and environmental energy. There’s nothing quite like getting behind the guys that go to your own school as they hit the turf.
Seething fluorescent lights beat down and reflect off their helmets; the scene is set like some sort of small-scale battle. There’s a real art to watching plays unfold and celebrating both mental and physical wins on the field and from the stands.
Football is the most popular sport in America. A study from Pew Research found that 53% of Americans said football is the country’s sport, compared to 23% for baseball and 8% for basketball.
There’s groundwork here, to say the least. Considering the solid support that Asbury athletics already receives from an active student body, the addition of a football program would elevate said support in an entirely new way.
College football is built for all the best parts of the Asbury athletics experience as it currently stands. Our student section, which is as powerful as it has ever been with an inflated class of freshmen, is built for football season. Painted faces, signs, chants and minigames – it’s the perfect mix.
You’ll get that pageantry at other events to a certain extent, but the physicality of football exudes a kind of intensity that bleeds into the audience. It’s a cohesive mania that’ll effortlessly fill any given night sky.
Though, Eagles football wouldn’t just be good news for the current student body. Undoubtedly, the addition of another major sport to the school’s repertoire would draw a new crowd of both competitors and fans.
This is a sport that has middle-aged families and folks long graduated coming back to their alma-mater grade schools to catch games every Friday night.
For many, it’s about more than their kids or grandkids playing. It’s about legacy and school spirit. Where it isn’t tradition, it’s bound to be soon.
Asbury has a chance to take part in that. With the gradual move that the athletics department is already making into more competitive conferences, the institution of the most popular sport in the country would be the cherry on top.
At the end of the day, it’s another opportunity for Asbury to show out, compete and glorify God in a way that can only grow the school going forward. That’s a win four times over.
