BATON ROUGE — As more than 100,000 LSU football fans pour into Tiger Stadium for the first time this season on Saturday afternoon when the No. 19 Tigers (0-1) face instate foe Nicholls State (6:30 p.m., CT, ESPN+), the theme will be celebration.

This fall is the 100th season of the Tigers' home off Nicholson Drive and there's certainly countless memories, games, moments, hugs and even some boos from supporters that'll be reveled in.

History and tradition runs deep for LSU and its fan base. But the athletic department knew upgrades were needed and what better way and time to bring those online and improve the Tiger Stadium experience than the venue's centennial mark.

"Enhancing the game day atmosphere has gotten a lot (through these upgrades)," LSU chief operating officer Keli Zinn said. "Our fans are of our utmost priority and importance. Look, this is a dated facility, one that's full of tradition and history and we wanted to keep that.

"But we wanted to concentrate on some of things for the fans that really allow them to enjoy what's the best thing about Tiger Stadium. And that's everything within here."

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Financed through the Tiger Athletic Foundation, the $19.8 million project features a new 150- by 38-foot video scoreboard above the north end zone as well as two video boards flanking the south end zone on both sides. There are new LED lights at the stadium, a feature that plenty of college football teams have gone to recently. The sound system has been revamped and three new ribbon boards have been installed.

LSU's new scoreboard has split and full-screen capabilities which will allow for improved playback of big plays and replays for challenges. There are new graphics for player introductions and plays in the game that call for celebrations like touchdowns and interceptions. Unlike before, all three video boards and the three ribbon boards now sync and can play off of one another.

"It can be easy to get lost on where we were versus where we are," Zinn said of the new upgrades that officially got off the ground in the spring of 2023. "A ton of time and effort going into this from our marketing and broadcast team, operations, in-game production; there's a lot that goes into this."

Operationally, LSU associate athletics director for marketing and broad operations Dave Haskin has a team of more than 50 people that will run the in-game production for LSU each home game. Haskin told The Daily Advertiser all the new graphics on the boards that fans will enjoy were built from the ground up for his team.

"We studied a few other schools, including some of our SEC colleagues and from those visits, we took things that we liked but we've made it LSU," Haskin said.

The LSU football team has had a preview of some of the new features inside Tiger Stadium and coach Brian Kelly said fans will be fully engaged into the game atmosphere and the "event" that is an LSU game.

"I remember when I was at Notre Dame, we had wooden bleachers and we had no jumbotron. What we found was that the history and tradition is one thing, but when everybody's looking on their phone for information and not paying attention to the game, it takes away from the game experience itself," Kelly said. "Now, when you look up on a massive board and it's got all the information, all the bells and whistles, you got ribbon boards always constantly feeding you information, it definitely helps the in-game experience.

"The lights add to what is increasing becoming much more of an event in Tiger Stadium and that's an enhancement as well as the speaker system. All that together, our players are going to enjoy just being in Tiger Stadium. It's going to catch them but they get so focused in on what's in front of them, but for the fans, it's going to be a heightened experience."

Zinn said some of the lighting strategies will take place pregame when the band takes the field as well as when the ever-popular "Callin' Baton Rouge" song by Garth Brooks blares between the third and fourth quarter. Lights outside the stadium have also been upgraded and allows the athletics department to do unique things like purple, green and gold to celebrate Mardi Gras during the offseason.

"It gives us a chance to highlight this venue in a way that a lot of people externally are going to see it as well," Zinn said.

The 2024 season, inside and out, at Tiger Stadium is all about celebration for LSU. There'll be big games once again, like when Ole Miss, old rival Alabama and even new rivals like Oklahoma come calling.

And LSU aims to capture those memorable moments again with better in-game production.

"This isn't something you bring online quickly. This was a long process, about a year and a half to full come to fruition," Zinn said. "We pulled the trigger on everything in the spring of 2023 and now here we are. We will be ready for our home opener.

"You pack 102,000-plus strong and it just doesn't duplicate across the country. We add some things within the boards, with the audio and the lighting effects both internally and externally gives us a great opportunity to highlight Tiger Stadium at its height."

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Cory Diaz covers the LSU Tigers for The Daily Advertiser as part of the USA TODAY Network. Follow his Tigers coverage on Twitter: @ByCoryDiaz. Got questions regarding LSU athletics? Send them to Cory Diaz at bdiaz@gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on Lafayette Daily Advertiser: What fans can expect at LSU games after Tiger Stadium upgrades