Top 10 things to know about LSU sports

• By SCOTT HOTARD
• Advocate sportswriter
• Published: Jun 14, 2009

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Baton Rouge is red — as in, “red stick” — in name alone. A trip up College Drive, and most other parts of town, prove that purple and gold serve as the primary colors.

Here are 10 reasons LSU sports dominate T-shirts and bumper stickers in Louisiana’s capital city.

Death Valley

The LSU campus boils over on Saturdays in the fall, forming one of the most renowned environments in college football. Tailgating fans attired in purple and gold welcome their rivals with “Tiger Bait!” taunts while feasting on jambalaya and gumbo. A Golden Era of LSU football has only intensified the Death Valley experience. With a pair of BCS championships in a five-season stretch, the Tigers staked their claim as college football’s team of the decade.

A century of legends

When the LSU basketball program celebrated its 100th season this year, the Tigers unfurled a banner in the Pete Maravich Assembly Center bearing the names of 16 former players: the all-century team. While the school’s basketball program hasn’t routinely produced premier teams, it has quite often produced premier players. Consider that Bob Pettit, Pete Maravich and Shaquille O’Neal, three of the names on the all-century banner, also made the NBA’s 50th anniversary all-time team. Longtime powerhouse North Carolina is the only other program with three players on that list.

Road to Omaha

If the streets in Baton Rouge seem a little less crowded in mid-June, they probably are. Fans of LSU routinely flock to the College World Series whenever the baseball team completes the road there. The Tigers have found their way to Omaha, Neb., a whopping 14 times, collecting five national championships along the way.

Across the board

While most fans throughout the country know LSU as a football school, the rest of the athletic department has its share of hardware as well. This past school year, the Tigers won overall Southeastern Conference championships in men’s basketball and baseball, while soccer and volleyball won divisional titles. Gymnastics made it back to the NCAA Super Six for the second straight year.

If you build it …

In the space of 10 days this year, the LSU softball and baseball teams celebrated grand openings of new ballparks. The new Tiger Park, home of LSU softball, includes sheltered batting cages, a clubhouse and 587 chair-back seats. The new Alex Box Stadium, one of the nation’s flashiest baseball venues, is a souped-up, more spacious version of the old one.

Mike the Tiger