A few card stunts. Maybe ISU on one side, and CYCLONES on the other.
One section for CA with t-shirt color enforced, and the other side just for students to do what they like without CAC doing anything.
For the KU, and Iowa, and really any big games i'd go for no seats (or benches) in the bottom sections, and just have a hand counter to ensure that every row has only about 5 extra people in it than normal.
We should encourage a person or two to run around in front of the bottom row of student seating and get the students pumped up.
Instead of having every timeout filled with ads, games, and the band, we should have one timeout given to the whole student section to do something together. I'd go for a chant, or some sort of singing without the band, but more on that below.
There will always be people who don't really want to get hyped up and yell, but these people shouldn't be seen as representing the students as a whole if we want to have one of the best home courts in the country.
Give people a reason to get amped up (like for instance, there is a basketball game) and minimal directions like "no throwing stuff or entering the court" and see what happens. If nothing improves then try going back to how it's been, but give all the CAC naysayers a chance to do something organically.
I like the idea of giving out a list of things to make fun of the other teams players for, but also put down embarrassing losses for the team. Other things to put on this are a list of all suspensions from their past with reasons why, and how much they're paying their coach. Any interesting recent tweets about girls or parties, arrest records, if they played really poorly in their last game give their stats. Coaching staff's marital problems. What other sports we've beat them at recently. Anything that a student could yell would be perfect.
Thoughts for the students in general:
Also, I would enjoy hearing the ACTUAL WORDS to the fight song without the band every once in a while, maybe even during the game play. Just get everybody to belt it out during a timeout or even during the game.
I don't know how it would work, but an iowa state dance like UNI's interlude would be cool to have.
The traditional american "OOOOOOO" is a start, but it could be a lot better.
The way they sing at soccer games in Europe during the whole game is sweet, but I don't think we can just get everybody to sing something. This is probably more than CAC is capable of, but if somebody could write a few of these up and get the students together one night to practice it would be awesome. Something like midnight yell practice at aTm. Pairing singing with blatant disrespect for the opponents would be excellent, but a "He scores when he wants, He scores when he wants, Georges Niang, He scores when he wants!" would be nice too. The students can't really stand united as a student section currently, because there's nothing like a song to bring us together. This is more of a european thing, but why not take it like we take chants from other schools?
Just to give people an idea of what I'm talking about, try listening to a few chants from this site.
Arsenal Fanchants, football chants lyrics submitted by pre
Thoughts on the band:
I for one like the band's chants, because if I were shooting free throws and heard whatever it is that they say I would be distracted and wonder what they're going on about. I think that they have to try to get everybody riled up, and we shouldn't need that, but we do. The only problem is that it doesn't work for most students. They play the fight song too much, and that takes away from it's effect. If it were up to me, once before and after each half, and the under 4:00 timeout is all. Everybody should know and sing the alma mater and the bells at least once each game. If we could take one before the game, and the other during the timeout in the 2nd half that would be perfect. The shhhhhh, WHOOO! chant should be done every game. Don't just play music to have a background atmosphere, just about ever song should have an action to go with it (or a vocal song) to get the crowd more involved.
Alma Mater - Iowa State University Alumni Association