Sic 'em Spirit

The power of shared experiences is important in both large and small ways, particularly in the world of sports fandom. 

For some, the Baylor Spirit shows itself in annual, sacrosanct acts that can only be explained among friends and the Baylor Family.

It’s the jersey or pair of socks that remain unwashed for months when the Bears go on a hot streak. It’s the game where a simple walk to the McLane Stadium concourse for a hot dog turns into watching the remainder of the game on the concession stand TV because you don’t want to change the momentum by moving or breathing differently.  

It’s a preseason staff swim across the Brazos or starting to prep a mountain of brisket and other hallowed Texas BBQ meats on Wednesday to be sure everything’s ready for the smoker pit on Saturday morning. 

It could be as simple as friends gathering for a pregame ritual, sharing a moment together after traveling from near and far before heading into the stadium.

For the Baylor faithful, the real value of the Baylor Spirit means showing up, no matter the time, weather or circumstance. 

Brisket on the Brazos 

Beyond the facilities, event and safety officials, the first of the Baylor Family to show up on game days are frequently the tailgaters — although their work typically begins even earlier in the week. 

Hobby Howell, B.B.A. ’86, has been feeding crowds at Baylor football games dating back to the Floyd Casey Stadium era 

when a smoker of ribs, brisket and sausage was the main hook for how Howell got his friends to the stadium at a time when, as Howell puts it, “We stunk in football.”

“A lot of my friends had season tickets, but they never would go to the game,” Howell said. “So, I said, ‘Well, why don’t y’all come on? Let’s all go to the game and I’ll cook.’ We can still be out there and have a good time.”

Howell was an early adopter and proponent of tailgating at Baylor, helping grow the tradition as the team moved to McLane Stadium and his family continued to grow. 

“I start on Wednesday and buy the meat and season it over the next day and then get everything ready because I’ve got a big smoker. When things are going well, I’ll do 30 racks of ribs and 25 pounds of beef and probably 80 pounds of sausage. We may have as many as 250 to 350 people.”

Adrienne, B.S. ’89, and Brad Conradt, B.B.A. ’89, caught the tailgating bug in 2010, moving their “BBQ on the Brazos” to McLane Stadium where they now expect around 100 people to pass through on a typical game day. 

For the Conradts, Howells and many other Baylor tailgaters, it’s about connection to Bears past and present, feeding generations of Bears and staying connected to old classmates who bring their own kids and grandkids out. 

“The generational bonding has been unreal,” Adrienne said. “Our kids and their friends are now bringing their babies to the tailgate and we have built deep, deep friendships. It’s allowed us to keep in contact with our Baylor friends. Our church life group comes. Our work colleagues come. We just love our Baylor Bears.”

While the competition and rivalry on the field — and on social media — leading up to a Saturday contest remain fierce and untamed, Howell frequently welcomes fans in opposing team colors to the table to break bread and brisket pregame. 

“We always invite them,” Howell said. “We always do. And we’ve made some great friends that way. I don’t want people to come to Baylor and come to a game and they’re not sure where to go. I want them to walk away knowing that we’re good people.”

Walking through the crowds on a Saturday morning can often feel like a walk through the rolls of the Baylor Hall of Fame, with former Baylor legends taking the opportunity to gather with old teammates and cheer on the current Bears.

Blake Blackmar, B.B.A. ’18, took a passion for BBQ that he picked up as a student-athlete for Baylor football into his Baylor Alumni era, getting “the boys” together for a day at the stadium. 

“The thing with tailgating is it’s such a good time to get old teammates together and see some other Baylor friends, meet other alumni and make new friends. It’s been so much fun to combine my hobby of barbecue with football and hanging out.”

Fan First Experience

For Blackmar and other former student-athletes, the move from the field to the stands can be an awkward transition. 

“I was fresh enough out that I’d walk in and get a whole bunch of, ‘Oh, shouldn’t you be out there?’” Blackmar said. “And I’m like, ‘Oh yeah, I wish.’”

Going from walking into the stadium through the players’ tunnel and locker room to the main entrance with the fans in the stands can bring its own adjustment period. 

“I remember the first time I went in, I couldn’t find the right gate and I couldn’t figure out where I was supposed to sit,” Blackmar said. “So, I only went into one game for the first few years. After that, I just basically stayed and watched it in the parking lot, tailgated. But eventually I made some friends, and they convinced me to start coming into the games.”

This fall, fans attending Baylor Athletics events and specifically Baylor football games at McLane Stadium will see the fruits of an early commitment of Baylor Vice President and Director of Athletics Doug McNamee’s first full year and first football season at the helm of the department: the Fan First Era.

For McNamee, that commitment starts with understanding the modern realities of attending a game in person.

“Our broad philosophy is to reduce the points of friction for the consumer,” McNamee shared on a recent episode of the Baylor Connections podcast. “It’s an effort to buy tickets and to gather friends or family to come to a game. In this day and age, with how well games are produced from a TV perspective, every game essentially is on TV. You can be a fan and never leave your couch. So, we really have to earn people’s willingness to make the effort to come to games.”

Rather than viewing fan engagement as a temporary project, McNamee has established it as a fundamental guiding principle for Baylor Athletics staff and operations.

“It’s a culture. First, it’s a mandate,” McNamee stated in an interview with SicEm365. “It’s not an initiative. It’s not one person. It’s not a task force. It’s a mandate: we are here to serve.”

“We need to make it an enjoyable and entertaining experience for our fans,” McNamee emphasized. “Don’t get me wrong. I want to win. I’m competitive, but we have to provide value from the moment someone steps onto campus.”

While competitive excellence remains paramount, McNamee recognizes that a memorable game day must deliver an atmosphere that resonates in the stands regardless of the scoreboard.

“We need to make it an enjoyable and entertaining experience for our fans,” McNamee emphasized. “Don’t get me wrong. I want to win. I’m competitive, but we have to provide value from the moment someone steps onto campus.”

For Howell and other Baylor fans, having McNamee — a Baylor alumnus and fan, first — at the helm of the program shows the commitment to how Baylor Athletics can lead as a differentiator in a landscape jaded by overwhelmingly negative sentiment around the commercialization of college athletics. 

“Doug gets it,” Howell said. “He’s been a fan. He has experienced Baylor Athletics events and tailgating like a fan. He’s experienced everything like we have. It’s not just a business to him. It is very much a business still, but it can and should be so much more than that.”

View from the Turf

Getting fans in the stands has far-reaching effects. Beyond the tremors of a raucous celebration after a huge play or the sights and smells of the stadium experience, the most consequential impact of a sold-out crowd is felt by the student-athletes living out their dreams to play the sport they love each Saturday in the fall.

“It means a lot to have fans show up for that — to be loud, yell — because you know that they’ll have your back and you’re out there trying your best,” said Blackmar, reflecting on his time in a Baylor uniform. “If you’re out there firing around, running full speed, chasing the ball, doing all the little scrappy things that just take effort, that’s a really easy team to root for. That’s a team that gets fans fired up, and that’s a team that’s fun to play for as well.”

Some days, that surge from the crowd may be the extra ounce of energy the team needs to finish off that last drive to victory. Ask our friends up I-35 in Fort Worth about the power of momentum in 2014, Blackmar’s first season in Waco.

“There’s no way that you can argue that momentum is not a real thing because when you get the whole team going in the right direction, everyone’s pumped, everyone’s fired up,” Blackmar said. “It’s loud. It’s everyone against the opposing team. There’s just no better feeling.”

Senior tight end Matthew Klopfenstein is one of the leaders on this year’s roster who feels the love when the community shows up and shows out for the Bears each week.

“It’s huge,” Klopfenstein said. “When you feel the support and the rally of all Waco behind you, there’s nothing better. Yesterday, during the practice walk-through, Coach Aranda had the entire band come in and had them blowing their trumpets and playing the fight song. You get the nerves out a little bit in pregame and kind of take a deep breath. But it makes it feel real. And in that moment it became real. A full crowd, loud stadium — we love it.”

An early indicator of what energy may be present on game day also is perhaps Baylor’s most visible and renowned tradition — the running of the Baylor Line. Named the USA Today Sports Readers’ Choice Awards pick for the best walk-out tradition in college football, this stampede of first-year students across the field sets the tone.

A packed crowd of student runners inevitably makes the rounds on social media, earning national admiration and almost always serving as the opening shot of the TV broadcast. 

Mixed in and around the Line are the hundreds of talented students providing a musical backing for the day’s contest — the marching band. 
 

Marching to the Same Drum

Baylor’s Golden Wave Band (GWB), the soundtrack of Baylor game day and fuel for the fan experience at McLane Stadium, has provided steady and constant support of the Bears since 1903.

Deborah Focarile, B.S. ’90, M.S.Ed. ’99, Ed.D. ’05, was a proud member of the GWB as a student, so she was overjoyed when two of her daughters, Emma, B.B.A. ’23, M.Acc. ’23, and Olivia, B.S. ’24, M.S.Ed. ’25, joined the band during their times at Baylor.

The Focariles remain closely tied to the band and return to play annually in the Golden Wave Alumni Band Weekend performance, showing the generational bonds between GWB members. This reunion weekend tradition is celebrating its 40th anniversary in 2026, honoring the tradition, fellowship and music shared over the years. 

“This milestone celebration is an opportunity to bring together Golden Wave alumni from every generation,” said Isaiah Odajima, M.M. ’99, director of the Golden Wave Band. “Whether this will be your first Alumni Band Weekend or your 20th… there is nothing quite like reconnecting with old friends, making music together again and celebrating the traditions that make the Golden Wave Band such a special part of the Baylor experience.”

For Deborah, beyond the songs they play or the formations they march in at halftime, the band can carry the team through all four quarters, regardless of the result. That starts with a spirit of competitive expectation — Baylor is going to win.

“I think the band is always an optimist as an organization,” Deborah said. “We show up to every game thinking, ‘This is a game we’re going to win.’ We bring that energy to every game. We show up and we play every game.”

Rain or shine, heat or cold, win or lose — the Golden Wave Band shows up.

“The Golden Wave is the soundtrack for everything that goes on at Baylor,” Deborah shared. “I don’t know what it would be like without the Golden Wave. We support them 100%, even as alumni. We do whatever we can to advance their cause and rally behind them at any point in time.” 

Each reunion weekend, the bonds that were shared as students quickly return and new ones are forged, with bandmates of all generations all marching to the same drum(s).

“Having something like the band be a common thread that runs through all those generations — it’s special and means a little bit more than saying, ‘Oh, I just went to college here,’” Emma said. 

Deborah added, “Even if we just met today in our section at Alumni Band, we’re family because we share that love of music and love of Baylor. We might not move as fast or play as well as we did 40 years ago, but it’s like time never passed and we just step on the field like we did, like it was yesterday.”

The energy from the band extends down to the field, with fifth year defensive end Kyler Jordan giving flowers to the Golden Wave Band for how they can affect the experience on the field.

“The band does so much for us,” Jordan said. “They help build the atmosphere. But [McLane Stadium] full… It’s a feeling you can’t even describe. Looking forward to doing that on Saturdays.”
 

That Good Old (Unbroken) Baylor Line

After the final seconds tick off the game clock, the teams shake hands at midfield, the student-athletes make their way the full length of the student section railing to high five classmates and then regroup in the north end zone in front of the bandstands.

In that moment, regardless of what motivated the crowd of 40,000-plus in the stands to gather — a long-held family bundle of season tickets, an athletics scholarship, a son or daughter in the band, a freshman running the Baylor Line and, yes, a perfectly smoked brisket — the Baylor Family pauses for a moment to sing “That Good Old Baylor Line.”

No matter the result, it caps off a day filled with the rituals and traditions of fall Saturdays in Waco.

“If I provide a good environment for people to have a good time and fellowship, then the outcome of the game doesn’t mean as much because I got to see so-and-so and I hadn’t seen them in a long time,” Howell said. “And we had a good time talking. We ate some and we drank some Dr Pepper and we had a good time. It’s about the people.”

Whether near or far, it’s a time for the Baylor Family to come home — to gather, to cheer, to eat and to fellowship.

“Baylor’s not just a place you go to college,” Deborah said. “It becomes part of who we are. We do all these things because we love Baylor. It gives us great joy now to share that love together as a family. We fling our green and gold afar.”

Most importantly, it gives the Baylor Family a chance to remember what drew them to Baylor to begin with, whether as a student, parent or fan.     

“Baylor’s a special place,” Blackmar said. “It was the perfect mix for me of football, Christian values, good education — it’s just a great place. The people are good people. And even now, I never have a bad experience coming back to Waco. It’s always fun. People are always nice and welcoming, and I’m really glad I made the decision to stay.”  

Whether it is a stadium-wide collective finishing “And that’s another Baylor… FIRST DOWN,” the relentless optimism of marching horns spread through the stands, a crucial pancake block on third down or a plate of ribs shared with a stranger, the anatomy of a Baylor game day relies on every single piece. 

A new season brings the opportunity to make your own rituals. Maybe it’s victory shakes at Health Camp and a drive by Pat Neff to see the dome lit up green. Maybe it’s heading back out to the tailgate for second (or third) dinner plates. Or maybe it’s turning your own porch light green to let your neighbors who might wear orange or maroon or purple know that the Bears won. 

Sports fandom is never experienced the same way twice across seasons. There are the thrills of victory and the bitterness of defeat. But the constant — the embodiment of the Baylor Spirit — remains the people who choose, week after week and year after year, to show up for each other. The power of showing up isn’t just to support this year’s team. It preserves a sacred, shared tradition. As long as the Baylor Family continues to gather on the banks of the Brazos, that legacy is safe.