The calendar year is coming to a close.

And for Louisiana Athletics Director Bryan Maggard, who’s approaching his seventh year on the job, there’s plenty to reflect back on as 2023 is about to be put in the rearview mirror. Some of that being positive and elevating things for the Ragin’ Cajuns and the athletic department as well as areas he needs to growth in.

The Daily Advertiser spent time with Maggard for an exclusive interview that delved into a myriad of topics from the state of athletics at Louisiana to how things are going with Name, Image and Likeness and more.

Cory Diaz: Bryan, what went well this year?

Bryan Maggard: In the noncompetitive space, Lourdes Stadium is definitely something that’s been a long time coming. It took a lot of people a long time for that project. So it’s great to kick that off and get it off the ground. In the competitive space, men’s golf winning the Sun Belt title, softball with two championships in the Sun Belt and in regionals at LSU, our baseball team being a regional at-large team for the first time since 2014. The men’s basketball championship. We have five total championships last spring. Those things help us elevate our program to a national level.

Diaz: Where are areas you feel like you guys missed the mark in 2023?

Maggard: We fell short of a Sun Belt Tournament championship in baseball. We fell short in super regionals in softball. Those things, although we were able to experience success, but you think about how close you came. We fell a little short. But I’m proud of what we accomplished in 2023 as a whole.

Diaz: You guys have started demolition on Cajun Field, which was a big step forward. After the football stadium, what things are next for UL athletics?

Maggard: We have some capital projects that we want to get moving on now that we got Lourdes Stadium underway. Not that we’re done with that with raising money for additional naming opportunities but we can now shift our focus on a baseball clubhouse. That’s about a $6 million project. We want to renovate Cajun Courts, that’s about a $3 million project. We have maybe ($500,000) worth of renovation work we want to do at Lamson Park and then we have some miscellaneous projects whether it be locker room renovations, scoreboard replacements, things like that all to about the tune of $20 million. Those will have to be privately raised monies. For us, you will see a new five-year strategic plan in January. Over the next five years, both raise and construct $20 million worth of capital projects.

Diaz: Do you feel like that’s obtainable? Aggressive?

Maggard: I do think it’s always aggressive when you’re in the space of raising money. But we’ve identified these key needs for our programs to continue to move us forward from a facility standpoint. I do think it’s aggressive, but I really think it’s obtainable.

Diaz: There’s always talk on social media about fan engagement and interest in UL games. How do you deal with that?

Maggard: I think each of us utilize social media in different ways. For me, it’s an engagement tool, allows me as a CEO to engage with a broad base of people. We do use it to gauge the pulse on things. It’s a piece of the puzzle. I don’t put stock I see or read on social media, nor take great offense to comments that might be negative to our department or me personally. We’re in an emotional industry. Fans are passionate. We realize better content put out there coupled with sports success will get more people involved in UL athletics.

Diaz: How would you gauge how NIL is going at UL?

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Maggard: We rolled out our NIL collective this year, Krewe Allons, and that has been a very positive tool for us to both educate and reach out to people to understand what NIL opportunities are about as well as fundraise. We’ve seen a lot of opportunities increase and materialize with the rollout of that collective. When looked at nationally, I do think it’s out of control. A situation where the original concept of NIL opportunities is not a bad thing. Anytime you involve humans in that, it tends to grow into something that it wasn’t meant to be. I think the recent memo put out by NCAA President Charlie Baker, I think we’re going to see as an industry and a nation, conversations rev up about how do we get our arms around NIL, it's relationship with the portal, student-athlete welfare. It’s going to be a welcomed discussion I think because we need to find a way to do a much better job as an industry to really get NIL and the portal under more control and hopefully get it back to what it’s true meaning was supposed to be.

Diaz: How important is it for UL to make it known that there are ample NIL opportunities to current and prospective student-athletes?

Maggard: We’re not competing with other Group of Five schools the same way the mid to lower-level Power Five schools have to compete with the elite Power Five schools. The biggest challenge is how do you keep the good talent at your school? It’s trying to find ways to create enough opportunities in NIL space for our student-athletes to prevent them from wanting or thinking they need to go to a larger program. It’s starts with the culture we have in each sport. It’ll make it harder for them to make that choice.

Diaz: What’s your assessment of how the 2023 football season went for the Cajuns?

Maggard: We feel fortunate that we are playing a bowl game. We set a program record for earning our sixth consecutive bowl game appearance. If you’re talking to myself, coach (Michael Desormeaux) or our student-athletes, I think we’d all tell you that we missed some opportunities in the season. Rather than being a 6-6 team, we could’ve easily been an 8-4, 9-3 team. A handful of plays didn’t bounce our way. Those are areas we need to figure out how to overcome that moving forward. I don’t know if it’s any one area. Is it the coaches’ fault? Is it the student-athletes’ fault? I don’t think we can point one finger. As a program, we’re still in our infancy as it relates to coach Desormeaux leading our program, staff and student-athletes. We’re in year two. Year one, we made it to postseason play. Year two, we’re in postseason play. In year three, we want to build off what we accomplished in years one and two. 6-6 is not our standard. Coach Desormeaux will be the first to tell you that. No one is more disappointed in the regular season than that guy.

Diaz: Desormeaux was not extended the annual one-year extension on his contract after year one. Do you anticipate him having a year tacked on to his deal?

Maggard: I anticipate us having a conversation after the bowl and we’ll go from there.

This article originally appeared on Lafayette Daily Advertiser: Louisiana AD Bryan Maggard Q&A: football season, NIL, projects