Football – Coastal Carolina Chanticleers or Louisiana Ragin’ Cajuns: Who has the better mullet game?

Tim Buckley, The Advertiser, Dec. 15, 2020

If things get a little hairy in the Sun Belt Conference Championship game between UL and Coastal Carolina, it’s understandable.

The No. 12 Chanticleers (11-0), after all, already have claimed a title. Not the obvious one,  at stake Saturday (2:30 p.m. CT, ESPN) in Conway, South Carolina.

Instead: best mullets in the league, maybe even the nation.

The No. 18 Ragin’ Cajuns (9-1) might take issue with that, but Coastal Carolina coach Jamey Chadwell is convinced his undefeated club – led by mullet-sporting linebackers Teddy Gallagher and Silas Kelly – wins.

“The Cajuns give us a run for our money, for sure. They’ve got some guys that look good with their stuff,” Chadwell said. “But I don’t know if anybody else rocks the mullet as much as we do here. So I’m gonna say we would be first place until I see otherwise.”

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That’s his tale, and Chadwell’s sticking to it.

But the Cajuns, led by reserve offensive guard David Hudson, contend with their own business-in-the-front, party-in-the-back look.

“They have a lot of mullets on their team. … They’ve got strength in numbers. I will say that,” said Hudson, a Lafayette High product who got his first career start in UL’s 70-20 win late last month at UL Monroe. “But I’ve got my ego, and I feel like I’ve got a better mullet.”

Hudson initially was reluctant to buy in.

“Me and a couple teammates, actually we got together and (said), ‘Let’s do mullets, let’s do mullets.’ ” he said. “Last season came around, I didn’t really do it. I was like, ‘Aw, shucks.’ ”

But fellow Cajuns Pearse Migl and Peyton Aucoin stayed on Hudson.

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UL offensive lineman David Hudson proudly rocks his mullet during a recent Zoom conference with reports. Tim Buckley, The Advertiser.

“They got on my butt about it,” he said.

The two tight ends won out.

Hudson succumbed, then relied on shear will to perfect his. Now he even has a favorite mullet style.

“I like to go with OG Brian Bosworth,” Hudson said, referencing the 1986 Heisman Trophy-finalist Oklahoma linebacker nicknamed “The Boz.” “That’s the classic look there.”

Hudson receives compliments but also grief, even getting called Joe Dirt – David Spade’s big screen janitor character circa 2001 – at times.

Whatever.

“I embrace it,” Hudson said. “It doesn’t matter.”

Or does it?

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“That seems to be a fad these days. It’s amazing how these things work in cycle,” UL coach Billy Napier told reporters who cover the Cajuns. “I’m sure a couple of you guys had mullets back in the day.”

Did Napier? He’s no cold fish, but is coy. Or is that koi?

Certainly not a mullet.

“Not that I remember,” Napier said. “Not that I know of.”

What Chadwell knows is that the whole mullet game pays.

Before Coastal Carolina recently beat BYU, T-shirts were produced trumpeting the so-called Mormons vs. Mullets game. It’s spun off a cottage industry, with Mulletts vs. All Y’All shirts now being sold online.

“I wish I could have gotten in on it. I could have made a little extra money off it,” Chadwell said. “It looks like they’re selling like hotcakes right now.”

Surely better than fish sticks. And haircuts.

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