HATTIESBURG, Miss.- With 58 seconds left on the clock and the homecoming crowd on its feet, Jamarice Wilder burst through the middle of the Louisiana defense for a 16-yard touchdown, and Renasant Stadium let out the kind of roar that Southern Miss' coaches are still talking about two weeks later.
Wilder's go-ahead score capped an eight-play, 75-yard drive that took less than two minutes, and the Golden Eagles' defense finished the job from there, forcing three straight incompletions and a turnover on downs to seal a 35-31 win on Oct. 24. It was Southern Miss' first Sun Belt Conference victory of the season, and the Eags followed it up a week later by holding off ULM, 35-21, in Monroe for their first road win of the Blake Anderson era.
Southern Miss Golden Eagles vs. ULM on Saturday, October 31, 2026, at Malone Stadium. | Josh House
Now, at 3-5 overall and 2-2 in league play, Southern Miss gets its biggest stage of the season. James Madison, the 2025 Sun Belt champion and a College Football Playoff team a year ago, comes to Hattiesburg for a 7 p.m. CT kickoff on Thursday, Nov. 5, with the game airing nationally on ESPN2.
It hasn't been the easiest first season for Anderson and a roster with roughly 75 newcomers, and nobody is pretending otherwise. But if those final minutes against Louisiana proved anything, it's that the people in the stands at The Rock can still have a say in how these games end.
This week, I asked Anderson, offensive coordinator Kyle Cefalo and defensive coordinator Joe Bolden about the impact the crowd had against the Ragin' Cajuns, and what it would mean to have that same energy, and potentially an even bigger turnout, when the Dukes come to town Thursday.
Southern Miss DB Landon Sylvie (25) breaks up a pass against Louisiana. | Josh House
Anderson didn't sugarcoat where things stand. He knows a 3-5 record isn't exactly a ticket-selling machine, and he knows there's still frustration out there. But he also knows what he felt in the closing minutes against Louisiana.
"Well, that'd be huge if we had a packed house, and I know that's asking a lot," Anderson said. "There hasn't been a lot to cheer about this season. I think the true people that are connected to what we're doing understand what we're doing here, and we've got nothing but positive. I mean, so much positive. There's always a negative group, and I get it, man. They've got to have something to be frustrated about, and there's plenty to be frustrated about this year, so are we.
"But we felt it in that game. It got loud. It can get louder. There's plenty of seats open for folks to come fill. This would be a huge moment for our football team and where we are if we could pack this thing and get a win on Thursday night."
Southern Miss head coach Blake Anderson encouraging his players during a game. | Josh House
Anderson's plea to the fan base: Don't wait for the finished product to show up and support.
"We don't want to wait till we get there," Anderson said. "We'd like to have it along the way. And so I just encourage people to come out. It would be huge for us. Our guys do feed off the energy in the building. It's real. And we just saw what it looks like when nobody shows up, and that was really hard. ... I wasn't trying to be disrespectful to [ULM] at all. Just the reality of it is different when the place is packed with energy from Eagle Walk to the end, and we feed off of it, and our guys appreciate it, as do I."
Then came the line that might as well be printed on a billboard along Hardy Street.
"I mean, what else are you going to do on Thursday night in Hattiesburg?" Anderson said. "Why not come out here? Our guys are going to play hard, and we're getting better. We are going to get there, hopefully sooner rather than later, but man, we do need the support of the community and the fan base."
Steven Robinson had three first-half touchdown runs against Louisiana. | Josh House
As the man calling plays from the press box, Cefalo admitted he doesn't get to hear much of what's happening in the stands on game day. He heard plenty about it afterward, though.
"It's always nice, man. We want as many people there as possible," Cefalo said. "Obviously, I'm up in the box, so I can't hear anything, but I know a bunch of people told me late in that game [against Louisiana] they felt like the crowd made a difference, and just the noise and the excitement and the energy. Now, it's our job to give them something to be excited about. I truly believe that. I've always believed that."
Cefalo brought up one late-game moment in particular as proof that the noise was doing its job.
Southern Miss OC Kyle Cefalo during a press conference. | Josh House
"I feel like we kind of brought them to life, and their energy definitely affected us offensively and defensively," Cefalo said. "I think Louisiana had a procedural penalty on offense late in the game, which was just awesome. And you can credit the fans for that one."
And for a coach who's still getting used to Mississippi weather and has actually been surprised at how nice it's been lately, he couldn't have drawn up a better setting for Thursday.
"This is going to be a great test for us, a good football team coming to town," Cefalo said. "But Thursday night, ESPN, you really can't ask for anything better. The weather's been beautiful. I thought it was going to be 100 degrees here for just pretty much every day, always. ... We're going to try to put a great product out there on Thursday night, and we hope as many people that are able to make it, make it and support these boys, because they're battling, they're working hard, but they're still playing hard, and they're still really excited."
Southern Miss DB Michael Robinson III sacks Louisiana QB Lunch Winfield. | Josh House
Bolden, whose defense made the final stand against Louisiana, spoke about Southern Miss fans the way someone who's spent a lot of time around big-time college football atmospheres would. He gets the expectations, and he respects them.
"I love Hattiesburg. I love the people of Hattiesburg. I love Southern Miss fans," Bolden said. "They're super passionate about this program, this school, and they want greatness, and that's what they expect. The history of this place has been greatness. You go back, they've had team after team go in and beat SEC schools and all those. Now, college football changes. Yes, it does, right? And sometimes those fans don't change.
"But at the same time, the expectation for every game is to go out and win it. ... I told the guys this, you can't go into a game with a mindset like you're going to get your rear end kicked. Why even play the game?"
Southern Miss DC Joe Bolden during the Golden Eagles' 35-21 win at ULM. | Josh House
Bolden was especially grateful for the fans who stuck around until the end against the Ragin' Cajuns, when his unit needed to get one more stop.
"I heard it in the fourth quarter of that ULL game," Bolden said. "I'm so appreciative of those people that stuck around, and you could hear it. Our guys fed off of it ... You really don't think about the atmosphere until you make a play or you don't make a play. And then you hear everything that's wrong with it, or you hear everything that's good with it. And right, wrong, indifferent, you feed off of those things, right?
"And I think the way our fans showed up, the consistency of their passion for this program, this university, has been awesome."
A scene from The Rock in Hattiesburg. | Josh House
Let's be honest about something: The Rock hasn't been full very often this fall. But anybody who wants to treat that as a Southern Miss-only issue hasn't been paying attention to the rest of college football.
National FBS attendance peaked at an average of 46,971 fans per game back in 2008 and slid for seven straight measured seasons , bottoming out at 39,848 per game in 2021, the lowest mark since 1981. Crowds have bounced back some since then, according to NCAA data reported by Axios , but a big chunk of that rebound has come from the sport's biggest brands. Twenty-eight stadiums averaged at least 100 percent of capacity in 2025, led by Michigan at nearly 111,000 fans per game.
Outside of that upper tier, though, the picture gets a lot murkier. In the Mountain West, all four of the league's top-drawing programs saw attendance dip in 2025 , including a 13.6 percent drop at Boise State. Even a blue blood like Florida State has felt it this season, with its home average down 7 percent through Week 5 compared with the same point last year, and based on photos surfacing online from Week 9, it feels safe to say that attendance has dropped even more for FSU.
Southern Miss averaged 22,051 fans per home game in 2025 , which ranked 79th in FBS, despite crowds of 33,485 for Mississippi State and 32,011 for Jackson State. So far this season, through four home games, Southern Miss shows an average attendance of 23,775. The Rock's full capacity is listed at 36,000.
So why are fans staying home? There's no single answer, but a few factors come up again and again:
Every game is on TV or a streaming service now, and watching from home in high definition, with no parking, no traffic and no concession lines, is easier than ever.
Weeknight and late-night windows bring national exposure, but they also make it tougher for working fans and families to get to the stadium. Southern Miss has already played a Tuesday night game at Troy this year, and Thursday's game is another weeknight kickoff.
Between the transfer portal and NIL, it's harder for fans to build a connection with players who might only be on campus for a season or two. Anderson addressed that directly at Fan Fest in August, telling Southern Miss fans to love the players while they're here . Still, when fans are investing money in these players and programs, only to see the players leave soon after, it can leave a bad taste in their mouths.
Conference shuffling has replaced a lot of traditional, regional matchups with opponents fans don't have much history with. Even with an in-state rival like Mississippi State, which Southern Miss has only played in football a few times per decade in recent years, the continuation of that rivalry beyond 2029 is in jeopardy due to the SEC going from having eight to nine conference games on its schedules.
Given how much inflation has affected the cost of living for many Americans over the last several years, many people are starting to feel the pinch. That's not to say it's the single reason why attendance is down, but when you think about how much groceries, fuel and everything else are right now, consistently buying tickets, parking and concessions becomes more of a strain when fans can simply watch from home, which ties back into No. 1 on this list.
Even with all those other potential reasons mentioned, nothing fills seats like a winning record, and Anderson himself acknowledged there hasn't been a lot to cheer about this season in that regard. If the Golden Eagles can keep stacking wins to end this season and carry that momentum into next season, attendance numbers should increase, even if they're not near full capacity. But as Anderson said, the team would love to have the diehard support from the fan base while they work to get to that point.
And at The Rock specifically, there's a bit of an optical issue, too. As Stadium Journey pointed out in a recent review, the stadium's tall grandstands can make a decent-sized crowd look half-empty, especially when fans spread out across the bleachers. From a TV perspective, crowds always look less full than they actually are, given that the west side (home side) is always much fuller than the east side, which is what people see when watching from home.
Southern Miss quarterback Landry Lyddy (18) with teammates Davis Dalton (11) and Steven Robinson (14) during Saturday's game against UConn at The Rock. | Josh House
Here's the thing, though. Even with all that being said, the Louisiana game proved that the Southern Miss fan base doesn't need a sellout to make a difference.
The Rock wasn't packed for homecoming. But the fans who were there, and who stuck around through a back-and-forth fourth quarter, were loud enough that a Ragin' Cajuns offense needing a score couldn't get out of its own way.
That's nothing new in Hattiesburg, either, although it hasn't happened as often as everyone involved would like over the last 15 years. This is a fan base that has watched its team knock off SEC programs and ranked opponents at The Rock, one that has stuck with the Golden Eagles through conference changes, coaching changes and a college football landscape that barely resembles the one many of us grew up on. That deep-rooted passion Bolden talked about didn't go anywhere just because the record isn't where anybody wants it to be.
And for the folks who have stayed away this season, Thursday is about as good of an invitation as you're going to get. Put 30,000-plus people inside that concrete, under the lights, on national television, and The Rock becomes a completely different animal. It always has.
Southern Miss HC Blake Anderson looks on from the sideline during a game against Arkansas State. | Josh House
Southern Miss (3-5, 2-2 Sun Belt) will be looking for its first three-game winning streak of the Anderson era when James Madison visits Renasant Stadium on Thursday, Nov. 5. Kickoff is set for 7 p.m. CT on ESPN2. The athletic department has dubbed it a Thursday Night Under the Lights blackout game, so fans are encouraged to wear black.
The Dukes have lost two games in a row, but make no mistake, this is going to be an extremely tough matchup for Southern Miss, and the Golden Eagles will need every bit of help they can get ... both on the field and in the stands.
Stay tuned to Southern Miss Golden Eagles On SI for more coverage leading up to Thursday night's matchup with James Madison.
This article was originally published on www.si.com/college/southernmiss as 'Our Guys Feed Off the Energy': Southern Miss Coaches Want The Rock Rocking for JMU Showdown .
