The excitement begins early in the morning, as fans fill the parking lots to tailgate before the first football game of the season on Saturday, Aug. 31, cheering on their Golden Flashes football team. 

The game marked the first football game won by Kent State since Sept. 16, 2023. The Golden Flashes took on the Merrimack College Warriors in Dix Stadium and won by a score of 21-17.

What exactly was it that led them to this victory? Perhaps it was the persistent school pride shown off by students of Kent State. 

Fans cooked food, played games and talked with friends as they anticipated the first game of the season. Tailgating seemed to be the part of game day that students were most enthusiastic about. 

Sophomore architecture major Michael Romano enthusiastically shared how his favorite part of game day is tailgating. “I love just seeing like a bunch of kids who love the school, a bunch of the college guys come up and hang out with their friends.” Romano said. 

Senior physical education sports performance major Kennedy Bowen explained how her favorite game day tradition is, “hanging out with my roommates and getting all dressed up and coming out to the game.” 

As tailgating dwindled down, it was time to start the game. Students rushed to the student section, so they could show off their school spirit. 

Students were seen sporting spirited outfits, running through the stands and yelling as loud as they could cheering on The Golden Flashes. 

The cheerleaders lead the student sections with cheers and tricks, and the dance team performs routines along with the marching band’s songs. These are quintessential parts to keeping the crowd’s energy up during game day.

At the beginning of the game they let the students run onto the endzone of the field, which gave them a chance to potentially be spotted on TV.

A student who was seen excitedly sprinting through the stands, cheering on the team and hyping up others was freshman hospitality and event management major Zyquese Brown. Although this may have been his first Kent State game, he seemed to already have an unmatched amount of school spirit. 

He used the word “lit” to describe the student section’s atmosphere, and with the score at the time being 14-3, it especially added to the “lit” energy of the student section.

After the second quarter, the marching band performed songs from James Bond films, along with the color guard. This year, President Todd Diacon took part in the school pride as he made two short video clips to go along with the band’s halftime show. 

Diacon re-created a scene where he talked about the school’s mascot, Flash, being stolen. The show was James Bond inspired, and Flash was seen being chased by a man in a white James Bond-inspired suit as part of the show. 

In the third quarter of the game the score was up to 14-3. Seeing the scoreboard go up to 14-3 fueled Brown’s hopes of the Flashes clinching a victory.

“They can’t mess with us today,” he said.

The school spirit stayed strong throughout the remainder of the game, resulting in the first win in two years. Hopes for the rest of the season now remain high, meaning the school spirit will continue to skyrocket.  

“I hope we have a good year, always up from last year,” Romano said.

Ava Drozd is a reporter. Contact her at [email protected].