Name-a-Day Calendar, April 2: Louisiana-Lafayette Ragin’ Cajuns
Page 147 of 365
Chosen in: 1962
Chosen by: Head football coach Russ Faulkinberry (probably) and sports information director Bob Henderson
Imagine the sports teams of the University of Louisiana at Lafayette being represented by a bulldog. You can’t, can you? Would you believe they’ve been known as the Bulldogs about as long as they’ve been known as the Ragin’ Cajuns?
From the beginning of the school’s intercollegiate athletics in the 1900s until the early 1960s, teams at what was then called the University of Southwestern Louisiana were known as the Bulldogs and had a bulldog mascot. Then came Russ Faulkinberry, who became the football team’s head coach in 1961 and almost immediately changed the university forever.
Accounts differ on whether the “Raging Cajuns” turn of phrase came from Faulkinberry himself or one of his assistants, but it was first uttered in reference to the football players themselves, most of whom were local to the region and many of whom were actually Cajun. In 1962, sports information director Bob Henderson decided that this nickname should become official for all of the school’s sports teams as a nod to Acadiana’s Cajun heritage and history, and so he made the switch himself. “Raging” was almost immediately shortened to “Ragin’” to create a better rhyme, and that’s what we’ve got today.
And if you’re wondering, “hey, Eli, why’d you call them Louisiana-Lafayette? Aren’t they just Louisiana?” Well…it’s a whole thing.
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