Oklahoma looks to improve tailgating with the move to the SEC

TULSA — University of Oklahoma President Joe Harroz isn’t naïve about what an SEC game day looks like. Harroz, who has been the school’s president for over three years, is aware of OU’s shortcomings when it comes to tailgating.

That’s why, with Oklahoma moving to the SEC in 2024, he’s pushing for new policies when it comes to tailgating on football game days.

“You all saw some of the drama over the last couple of years over this,” Harroz told SoonerScoop.com Wednesday at the Board of Regents meeting. “So it seemed like it was the right time even if we weren’t going to the SEC to take a look at our policy. And see does it provide the best fan experience? Does it create the right safe environment? And the balance of those two. But with us going to the SEC, it was important to not just check in for a routine check, but look at it pretty deeply.”

It’s on the mind of head coach Brent Venables, too. In talking about OU’s 2024 SEC schedule, he made it a point to bring up tailgating.

“Every patch of the grass is going to have a vehicle on it… Every patch,” said Venables during the ESPN+ schedule release show. “And the grass is going to grow back just fine. And people are going to clean up after themselves. When you go on the road, you’re going to see tailgating at its finest. Hopefully, we can progress and be able to do that.

“To me, tailgating creates this amazing place to have memories, to remember moments and to build relationships and to share passion, love and joy for your university. It’s one thing to do it on a slab of concrete. But to compete and find a spot and camp out for a couple of days and do your thing from the beginning to the end of a college Saturday, (it’s special).”

Updating the tailgating policies at Oklahoma was one of the agenda items on Wednesday’s Board of Regents meeting. Though, what updates there will be is unclear. The university has a “tailgating committee” which will provide recommendations to the board this summer. Those updates will take place this season.

One of those updates is opening tailgating in areas that have not been previously open to the public. Specifically, fans have been disgruntled over the inability to tailgate on Lindsey Street, which was once a popular location. That has been a rule since 2017 when the residential colleges were built.

That may no longer be the case with the new policies.

“I think we have to look at all of it,” Harroz said when asked about Lindsey Street. “They’re going to come back with some recommendations. My sort of request was let’s be really creative. Let’s find the best possible experience we can generate and let’s draw upon those that have done it well. Everything we’re doing in Norman has to be re-examined in light of moving to the SEC. It’s got to be bigger and better. That goes from how we perform on the field to how we create the experience for our fans.

“So yeah, is that on the table? Absolutely. It’s all on the table and we’re going to come back with a set of recommendations that will make it the kind of experience it needs to be.”

Harroz emphasized that he wants the game-day atmosphere to be “bigger and more fun” moving forward. He said they have studied several SEC schools to attempt to replicate their atmosphere. Regardless of what that looks like, it’s clear Oklahoma knows it has to improve the game-day experience.

Maybe they’re SEC-ready after all.

“We all know the names of those (schools) that do remarkable things,” Harroz said. “I haven’t been there, but I know it’s something special. You can sort of go through the list. Part of this from both our perspectives was to go take a look at those… Look at those experiences and see what we can incorporate to make our experience special and make sure it was appropriately safe.

“With this transition, we need to do it. And doing it a year before we go there gives us the chance to find what are the bugs in it going into next year’s season.”