Two years ago, an average of 115 million people tuned in live to watch the Kansas City Chiefs and Philadelphia Eagles battle it out in Super Bowl LVII. In just two days, the same two teams will hit the field again — this time in Super Bowl LIX, featuring a half-time performance by Kendrick Lamar and SZA.
As people around the country prepare for one of the biggest sports events of the year, campus groups are doing the same.
Student organizations, fraternities and program houses around campus are making use of the Super Bowl to connect with their community. Among the groups hosting Super Bowl parties are Beta Omega Chi, Rural Students at Brown, Harambee House and the Alpha Delta Phi Society.
BOX aims to be a welcoming space “not only for Black men, but for the Black community around campus,” Yabeke Zike ’25, BOX’s finance chair, said in an interview with The Herald.
Hosting a Super Bowl watch party “is one of our ways of doing that,” he added.
Despite BOX’s focus on the Black community at Brown, BOX President Korey Sam ’25 decided to make the party a public event to “spread the love and spread the community,” he said.
On Sunday, BOX will host their fourth Super Bowl party in their Olney Lounge. According to Sam, they will serve pizzas, calzones, wings and tenders.
“We want to give the traditional football Super Bowl Sunday experience,” Sam said. “We have the lounge, we have the projectors set up, we have speakers — it’s a more homey environment.”
Sports, Zike and Sam said, are a vehicle for connection.
“A lot of people were involved in sports in high school and put those things aside when they came to college,” Sam explained. “I feel like it’s a good way for people to engage, and it’s accessible for everyone. If people are free, if they have time, they can just come kick it with us.”
Eliana Hornbuckle ’25, co-chair of community and connections for Rural Students at Brown, also emphasized the uniting power of sports.
RS@B advocates for the admission of more rural students to institutions of higher education, Hornbuckle explained. Once these students get to Brown, the club tries to help them adjust to the urban lifestyle on campus.
“We’ve had a Super Bowl watch party every year that the club has officially existed,” Hornbuckle wrote in a message to The Herald. “For our club, it’s an event that takes very little time to plan but has a large impact.”
As campus groups use the Super Bowl to gather active students on campus, the event offers a way to remember those who have long graduated. Sunday’s game will mark the ninth-straight Super Bowl featuring a Brown football alum.
Since 2011, Mark Donovan ’88 has served as president of the Chiefs. For the past 14 years, he has been part of the team’s resounding success, including four Super Bowl appearances — not including this Sunday’s — and three Super Bowl victories.
“As somebody that grew up loving the game of football, loving the NFL and everything it stood for, to be a part of that is kind of overwhelming,” Donovan said to NFL Network’s Judy Battista and Tom Pelissero on the opening night of Super Bowl LIX.
Whether as part of a student organization, as president of a team or simply on their own, millions of people will be tuning in for Sunday’s Super Bowl rematch. How will you be spending it?
Lydell Dyer is a sports editor for The Herald. A junior hailing from Bonn, Germany, Lydell is studying nonfiction English and political science, and if he's not off "making words sound pretty," you can find him lifting heavy circles at the Nelson.
