Sugar Bowl parade ushers New Year for thousands of visiting fans
NEW ORLEANS (WVUE) - Visiting fans in town for the New Year’s Day Sugar Bowl showdown are getting a taste of how New Orleanians celebrate such an occasion.
And for the Dixon family, the stakes of Monday night’s game between the Washington Huskies and the Texas Longhorns couldn’t be higher.
“It’s so important for them to win this, seriously. My brother, it’s his first year playing D1 at Washington,” said Ryan Dixon. “Cornerback. Good interceptions and all that. Tell your quarterbacks to watch out.”
Final preps and celebrations wrapped Sunday evening the best way New Orleans knows how: with a parade through the French Quarter.
But for that starting senior cornerback, it’s all business on a night typically spent partying.
“No, we ain’t having no fun. The fun is going to happen after we win tomorrow,” said Thaddeus Dixon.
Longhorn fans threw up their horns in droves and gave some hot takes on their final score predictions.
“Michael Penix is going off, but they’re not winning,” one Texas fan told Fox 8.
“I gotta say we’re coming away with it tomorrow. Gotta go in confident,” said another Longhorn. “90-0 for me.”
When in NOLA, you eat as the locals do. Sometimes, more than once.
“I actually got beignets twice at Cafe du Monde. Unbelievable,” said another fan. “I still don’t know what chicory is, but the coffee was pretty good, too.”
The tourist cash is flowing through the city.
One veteran merchandiser says the Huskies started off strong, buying up all the purple they can find, but the Longhorns are creeping up in the spending competition.
“We did buy a lot of Sugar Bowl champ shirts that we don’t normally buy, because the level of this game is so high,” said Sports Mania owner John Smith.
Come Tuesday, what could be in store for the boxes of shirts for the losing team?
“My daughter is on her honeymoon in Vietnam, so I’m probably shipping everything to Vietnam and asking her to stick around and sell some product for the loser,” Smith said.
Fans of both teams leave in 2023 hoping to start the new year on the right side of the scoreboard.
The Sugar Bowl victor will advance to the January 8 National Championship game in Houston, where they will take on the winner of Monday’s Rose Bowl between Alabama and Michigan.
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