My Pumpkins are Gonna be on ESPN!

A few days ago I got a call from one of my sorority sisters whose fiancé, Brian, works as Coach Steve Spurrier Jr.’s assistant as well as interns with the equipment managers for the Carolina football team. She asked if I could help Brian carve some pumpkins. I was a little confused at the request but after talking with him I found out that our football team wanted to bring pumpkins to put on the sidelines at our game vs. Tennessee on Halloween. ESPN loves it when there are themed decorations that teams bring to games and will use them for some shots when they televise the games. Last year Tennessee brought a pumpkin to our stadium and ESPN kept showing it on the sideline so this year Carolina wanted to bring a pumpkin to them. I love random craft projects so I told Brian I’d be happy to help.

Last night I did a practice round to test out my “skills” and see what I can and cannot pull off when it comes to pumpkin carving. I’ve never done anything too detailed before and I’ve also never done a pumpkin with the shaved look where you don’t cut all the way through. My test runs were okay, but my final products were definitely the best.


After work Brian came and picked me and the pumpkins up and we headed over to Williams-Brice Stadium to put them in a big refrigerator so they’d be ready to take to Tennessee in the morning. Brian was super nice and ended up giving me a mini tour of the stadium. I got to go in the locker room, several conference and pressrooms, as well as see the weight room, laundry room, and even walked out onto the field! It was truly awesome. At the end he and his boss gave me some (expensive!) Under Armour Gamecock gear as a thank you. I got a black zip up jacket for myself as well as a garnet pullover jacket for my dad and they’re going to send me a polo soon for my dad too. Looks like I’m done with Christmas shopping!☺

Although I did spend a TON of time carving the pumpkins – somewhere in the 14 hour range to plan out and carve all four – I had a lot of fun doing it and it was totally worth it! I doubt I’ll ever get another chance to walk out on the field at Williams-Brice or go into the football team’s locker room. Plus, my pumpkins might make it on ESPN!

We play Tennessee at 7:45 p.m. ET on Saturday so tune in, cheer on my Gamecocks, and look out for my pumpkins!

UPDATE: My pumpkins were all over ESPN! Before and during the game they showed them probably six or seven times and they were also featured on the gamecocksonline.com gameday blog. Here's a picture of them at Neylan Stadium in Tennessee!