On Saturday, September 30th, the University of Central Florida made its home debut in the Big 12 Conference. If you don’t know anything about UCF football or conference alignment, here’s a little rundown. In 2011, UCF joined the Big East Conference, which was later renamed the American Athletic Conference. The university was a part of the American Athletic Conference for the past 11 years, until now. We are now a part of what is called “The Power Five.” This allows for more exposure, funding, and opportunities for UCF!
Being a part of a conference as great as the Big 12 means big things for the school. One of the first awesome things the school got due to being in our new conference was a stellar performance from DJ Pauly D. On September 8th, UCF announced that the Big 12 Conference would bring in the DJ for the first home game in our new conference. Pauly D is most known for his past on the hit reality television show “Jersey Shore.” The DJ was on the popular show for 6 seasons, easily becoming a fan favorite. He had a lifelong love of music so becoming a DJ seemed like the perfect thing for him to do afterwards.
Fans of UCF football were ecstatic to hear that Pauly D would be coming down to Central Florida. To say he did not disappoint would be an understatement. He was off to a good start when he walked out in a UCF jersey causing the crowd to go wild! The atmosphere was electric with fans jumping up and down and dancing to all the songs coming from the speakers.
DJ Pauly D hyped up the crowd by playing crowd favorites like “Love Story” by Taylor Swift and “Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (A Man After Midnight)” by ABBA. Not only did he play banger after banger, he even threw out t-shirts and brought out everybody’s favorite mascot, Knightro.
UCF students call the FBC Mortgage Stadium “The Bounce House” for a reason. That was shown when Pauly D started playing a fan-favorite song, “Zombie Nation.” Normally in the stadium when this song plays, students will jump up and down making the stadium bounce while chanting “U-C-F Knights!” The DJ performance was in IOA Plaza and not technically in the stadium, but that still didn’t stop fans from keeping the tradition alive.
Once the actual game started, fans were treated to a riveting football game with the UCF Knights playing the Baylor University Bears. We saw some great plays by stars like Quarterback, Timmy McClain and Running Back, RJ Harvey. The final score of the game was not ideal, but I can wholeheartedly say everyone in attendance had a blast thanks to DJ Pauly D.