November 18th, 2023, just like any other Saturday in Harrisonburg. Right? WRONG!! College Game Day, a college football premier pre-game show came to the Quad Saturday morning. The show travels to different college campus each week from the early September to late January. College game is on its 36th season and is a football fan’s favorite show to watch before a full day of Saturday college football.
I truly had no idea what to expect as I entered the line to go into the closed off section right behind the stage, called “The Pit.” I waited for a total of three hours to be closest to the stage to hopefully be seen on national TV. As I stood and waited for the arrival of the crew from 5:00-9:00 am I was so content and excited, without a care in the world. One by one the hosts and sports analysts arrived at the show, Rece Davis, Pat McAfee, Lee Corso, Kirk Herbstreit, Desmond Howard. All men. Was I surprised? Not really. Was I disappointed? Extremely.
I sat back and watched as we all cheered on these five men I have never even heard of before. Four middle-older aged white men and one black man crowded around a table to talk about more men playing a football game. Not to mention that 26,000 people came to support this event. As I looked deeper at the College Game Day crew, I wondered what this crowd would look like if the men were replaced with women. If the women were replaced with non-conforming people. Then what would the crowd look like? What if instead they were talking about men crashing into each other to win a football game, they talked about race issues, gender issues, LGBTQ+ issues?
I can only assume that it would not be 26,000 people at JMU/Harrisonburg population that would show up to support. The franchise of college football is built off the patriarchy that instills men superiority in society. Shows like College Game Day are possible because society feeds into the narrative that sports are fun to watch, but only if it’s men. Possibly we will throw on a women’s game IF they are deemed “good enough.” Putting an immense amount of pressure on female athlete to always perform to their highest level.
To be fair here, there was one female-presenting reporter at the College Game Day show, Jess Sims. Yet, she was not allowed on the stage or to talk about sports, but she went to interact with fans and got one section on TV. Is that good enough? To check the box and say you have one female reporter, who covers the least amount of airtime.
Although, I had the best time watching and being involved in the College Game Day activities. Looking at real-life events through a feminist lense gave me an entirely new perspective on the College Game Day experience. Not to say now I have a negative view on the experience, but a changed one. If I can see what needs to be changed, so can you. It is all about perspective.
ShoutOut! James Madison University 
I inform wasnt able to attend college gameday in person but I watched it on TV. Seeing it on the TV was something I will never forget. I could see and feel the energy and I loved seeing my school have so much pride. I think we often forget to live our lives and enjoy the small things when we’re in school. Watching college gameday made me remember to slow down and enjoy the moments we have left. I like that your brought up the representation of woman and the lack of it. I feel like women often get overlooked when events like this happen due to it being a “male sport.” Women showed up to this gameday and deserve to be highlighted as wel.
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This blog post helped to give me a new perspective on the college game day weekend as well. I had a great time at those events and it had never even crossed my mind to look at what kind of female representation they had.
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Thank you for sharing this, and I also wanted to further your thinking pertaining to the crowd present at Game Day and who is platformed. Specifically, I actually read a blog post on another site as well as this site of JMU students detailing their experience at the last Game Day. College Game Day has been notorious for attracting crowds of people and within these crowds there have been heightened sexual harassment and assault, as well as vulgar phrases and attitudes towards women, femme individuals, and demeaning language overall. This individual recounted how women were groped, and there was a variety of signs about the school who we had played against, Villanova, but specifically women at their school were talked about in degrading ways with posters like “Villanova girls are spitters” and told “show us your. I’m glad that this College Game Day saw a significant decrease in this, at least from the posters I observed and this individuals I talked to but I don’t want to speak for every individual that attended or may have experienced something else. There is definitely an overlap between sporting and events and misogyny, and it is definitely worth considering how might we rework some of these narratives. Because if these spaces were made to feel safer for all identities then there might be more attendance and we might view the populations who are allowed to enjoy such events a bit differently. There are also other ways to think about this especially in terms of why events like this get such a turn out but why SOGIE or CMSS events don’t attract similar audiences and how we can all maybe support our community beyond just the sporting culture of JMU.
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Awesome post! I attended college game day, and it was a blast. Although I might not understand all of the technical parts of football the atmosphere was incredible. to see so many students, Alumi, and JMU supporters show out for this special day was so incredible.
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Great Post!! You bring up a good point about how there are only men who participate in gameday, maybe they should consider adding some women to the discussion.
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