Louisiana ended up winning 42-27, despite being out-coached by the opposition. Good job, Cajuns.
Shit's getting bad there. There are pictures posted of a guy from Saturday who was escorted out of the stadium for wearing a shirt that said to fire the AD. At homecoming, a plane has already been hired to fly a banner over the stadium/tailgates saying the same thing.
Pictures on social media and message boards have been posted showing the AD leaving the stadium (using the back, little used exit opposite where he would park) before the game was over.
Former Rice head coach David Bailiff has been seen during tailgating and inside the stadium over the last two home games. He is rumored to be making a play to become the AD. The AD and head football coach have been making veiled comments about each other in media sessions/letters to the public.
This is my application to lead the city's tour division:
It is an awesome, awesome place in terms of potential. This is a video of just the STUDENT tailgate FIVE hours before kickoff at a game last year. The school is widely known to have the hottest girls at any college in the state, and it is also known as the biggest party school in the state, though the academics are pretty strong for such a big school. But yeah, the girls are absurd there.
This is just one half of the student tailgating area. As you can see, companies like Bud Light, Monster, etc. have their own tailgates within the student tailgating area each game. The student tailgates are said to get 4000-8000 students at them every game, but unfortunately, only a small fraction of those actually come into the stadium for the game since they never win. Just alone in the student tailgate you have multiple live bands and multiple hired DJs.
The regular (non-student) tailgating is just as impressive:
The stadium is beautiful and is in an athletic park next to campus next to the baseball stadium, softball stadium, and track and field center, all of which are nice:
in the picture above, the grass part on the top is now a children's play area. Each home game, they have a bunch of inflatables for them to play on/in and a petting zoo which includes pigs, rabbits, baby deer, goats, and some other smelly things. It's fenced in and has employees working it, so you can drop your children off all game and come back to check on them at halftime. The two small screens on each side of the facilities building are now huge screens that take up much of each of those areas. The bottom grass section is usually full of older kids on cardboard sliding down the hill during the game. The small building to the right of the main entrance of the stadium is a glass, air-conditioned enclosed pavilion. It has restrooms and seating for certain donors. They have white-table clothed tables and chairs in front so people can eat and have alcoholic drinks while watching the game.
This is an older photo but shows the other side. The grass sections are taken up, mostly, by the two huge screens. The top right tent area is now the pavilion. The bottom of this picture shows an entrance to a gift store and football/dance team museum. The top section is the coaching offices, weight room, locker room (which is FBS level), dining area, meeting spaces, and a large dining/meeting area that the general school uses way too much.
I mentioned the spring-fed river that runs through campus (San Marcos River). That one is two blocks from downtown, stays 72 degrees year-round, and is packed with people swimming, tubing, kayaking, and sunbathing. There is also another one (Guadalupe River) that is a more natural river; you can't see the bottom, it is much wider, and is packed on every summer day.
Since the enrollment has exploded, both the school and private developers have had to build a ton of more housing, so everything is new. The on campus housing is nice, but the off campus housing is like living at a Vegas resort with the pools, 3500 square foot cottages, etc.:
And the nightlife is second to none for college towns. The Square encompasses the area around the old courthouse. Just about every building is a bar/eatery/store/music venue. Then, each street that branches off of the square has tons of more of the same. Each night there is good activity out there, but Thursday-Saturday the sidewalks are packed. Many of the bars have rooftop areas or porches that are always packed:
If students get bored off the nightlife there, there are a half-dozen buses which run students back-and-forth to Sixth Street in Austin (a huge, pedestrian only party area on weekends). It is common for large groups of University of Texas students to make the 25 minute trip to San Marcos to go out and for Texas State students to head to Austin.
But it isn't just a party city. There are always family oriented activities going on. Every other Saturday on the Square, there is a huge arts fest where each artists/craftsman gets a tent for their merchandise. The alternating Saturdays turn into a farmer's market. A few blocks away on the green, each Tuesday night is "Family Movie Night" where people bring their own blankets/chairs and watch a different movie on the inflatable screen. Each Thursday night, the same thing takes place except it is a free band and opener. Each of those nights brings food stations to sell to the attendees.
There are two different food truck areas that are extremely busy. Purgatory Creek Trails are about 12 miles long and have many different trails built into it. I believe there are six trail heads throughout the city; some of it is heavily wooded, some open air, some elevation, some rocky.
Ten minutes from campus, there are the regular Tanger Outlets (Ralph Lauren, Nike, etc.) with a hundred stores. But right next door to it are the Premium Outlets which have another 100 stores with some really rare outlets (Gucci, Prada, Versace, Armani, Neiman Marcus Last Call, Saks Off Fifth, etc.).
The campus is beautiful. They have developed some really unique aspects, my favorite of which is the Bike Cave. It is a free "garage" on campus where students can come to buy a bike, get help fixing a bike for free, or use any of the tools and parts provided (and there are a lot) to fix their bikes on their own.
The students absolutely love the place. Talk to any of them about to graduate and they will tell you that they don't want to leave and are hoping to find a job in San Marcos after graduation. Usually, the Greek/nightlife/athletic students will talk about loving their school, but I've heard it from every kid I've talked to . . . regardless if they are new freshman, dorks, kids without a big social group, or whatever, every single kid I talked to said they love being there.
And some videos of the campus: