The full cadet wing at the Air Force Academy will again be in attendance for the full football schedule.
The academy announced on Thursday that it would revert to the previous policy of making attendance at Falcon Stadium mandatory for all of the roughly 4,000 cadets.
“It certainly is a great win for Air Force Athletics and our community,” said Matt McGahey, the senior associate athletic director for external operations who oversees all external operations and revenue generating functions for Air Force Athletics.
“It showcases our tradition, it showcases the passion of our cadets and then it’s a home field advantage, 100%.”
Last year brought several changes to that policy, eventually landing on the decision to have the full cadet wing at the opener on Parents’ Day Weekend and for home games against rival service academies and half of the cadets at the other four home games. At one point the plan was to have just a quarter of the cadets at some games.
The 2024 change was a break from the longtime norm for the service academies, which have always had the backing of all of their cadets at their games.
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Full cadet wing attendance no longer required for Air Force football games, marking the end of a tradition
At Air Force, the cadet march-on is routinely part of the pageantry of game days along with the parachute fly-in from the Wings of Blue and a flyover from a military aircraft.
“We collaborated with all of our base partners on this and we’re all looking forward to what football game days will look like at Air Force this year,” McGahey said.
Air Force has also made public its plans to lift the requirement of a base pass for football game days. Those 18 and over in attendance are still required to have a government-issued ID with them while on base, but no special pass will be required to gain entry starting at 9:30 a.m. for the opener.
Passes will still be needed for other events on academy grounds, with passes now being issued on a monthly basis.