Remember last fall’s Spartan Blackout?
The concept was devised by the University of Tampa Athletic Department last year.
Spartan Blackout is where UT’s home fans fill the venue with as many black shirts as possible in support of the team during a given athletic event.
In October 2009, more than 900 people attended UT’s first Blackout event, a men’s soccer match against Saint Leo.
The Spartans won the match 5-1 and captured a share of the Sunshine State Conference regular season championship that night.
Based on the success of that game, UT plans on holding more Blackout events.
The men’s basketball team will be the next squad to try it, as they face Lynn on Feb. 6 at the Martinez Center.
Much like the first Blackout event and similar promotions at other schools, this team hopes to fill up their side of the gym with the familiar black shirts.
“Some of the teams do similar things around the country,” Tampa head coach Richard Schmidt said. “It’s a good thing.”
According to junior Rashad Callaway, the University came up with the idea after he and others involved with UT athletics attended a conference in Boca Raton last September.
“Saint Leo had a Whiteout game,” Callaway said. “We got the idea from them, and shortly after that we did the Blackout for the soccer team.”
And a good idea it was.
Saint Leo’s first Whiteout volleyball match in 2008 drew a Division II record crowd of more than 500 fans, and the success has yet to let up for either school.
Now that Tampa is in on the fun, they plan to maximize the event’s potential.
“The school is trying to do it for all the sports teams,” Callaway said of the promotion’s future.
Schmidt is hopeful that the Blackout will bring more energy to the game.
“We’ve been getting some students,” Schmidt said. “But they were out of school so long (during the winter break) that it was bad for some of our conference games.
Hopefully this game brings more.”
The Blackout game against Lynn tips off at 4 p.m. on Feb. 6, following the women’s game against the SSC rival.
Ryan Burkett can be reached at rburkett@ut.edu.