The 2021 Louisiana Ragin' Cajuns football team represented the

University of Louisiana at Lafayette The University of Louisiana at Lafayette (UL Lafayette, University of Louisiana, ULL, or UL) is a public research university in Lafayette, Louisiana. It has the largest enrollment within the nine-campus University of Louisiana System and the s ...

in the 2021 NCAA Division I FBS football season. The Ragin' Cajuns played their home games at

Cajun Field Cajun Field is a football stadium located on the South Campus of the University of Louisiana at Lafayette in the city of Lafayette, Louisiana. Nicknamed The Swamp, it is the home field of Louisiana Ragin' Cajuns athletics. Cajun Field is primaril ...

in Lafayette, Louisiana, and compete in the West Division of the Sun Belt Conference. They were led by fourth-year head coach

Billy Napier William Hall Napier (born July 21, 1979) is an American football coach currently serving as head coach at the University of Florida. From 2017 until 2021, he served as head coach at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, amassing a 40–12 rec ...

. The Cajuns began the season with an away matchup against

Big 12 The Big 12 Conference is a college athletic conference headquartered in Irving, Texas, USA. It consists of ten full-member universities. It is a member of Division I of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) for all sports. Its f ...

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2020, it is the second-largest U.S. state by ...

and concluded their regular season at conference and in-state rival Louisiana–Monroe. Napier was named the head coach of the Florida Gators on November 28. He announced that he would coach in the Sun Belt Championship Game on December 4 before departing. Napier led the Ragin’ Cajuns to their first outright Sun Belt championship win, defeating the Appalachian State Mountaineers, and left the Ragin’ Cajuns on a victorious note. On December 5, the same date as Napier's departure, Louisiana announced that then-offensive coordinator

Michael Desormeaux Michael John Desormeaux (born September 29, 1985) is an American gridiron football coach and former player. He is the head football coach at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, a position he has held since the final game of the 2021 season. ...

would be promoted to head coach for the team's bowl game and the 2022 season. In his first game, Desormeaux defeated Marshall in the

2021 New Orleans Bowl The 2021 New Orleans Bowl was a college football bowl game played on December 18, 2021, with kickoff at 9:15 p.m. EST (8:15 p.m. local CST) and broadcast on ESPN. It was the 21st edition of the New Orleans Bowl, and was one of the 20 ...

Previous season

The Ragin' Cajuns finished the 2020 season 10–1, 7–1 in Sun Belt play to finish in first place in the West Division for the third consecutive year in the Sun Belt Conference and Conference Co-Champions in arguably the best finish in the history of the program. The win over Iowa State marked the first victory against a ranked team on the road in team history, the second victory ever against a ranked team, and the highest ranked team ever defeated. The following week, the Cajuns were nationally ranked for the first time since the 1940s, reaching 19th in the

AP Poll The Associated Press poll (AP poll) provides weekly rankings of the top 25 NCAA teams in one of three Division I college sports: football, men's basketball and women's basketball. The rankings are compiled by polling 62 sportswriters and broad ...

. During their Week 2 overtime victory against Georgia State, the Cajuns secured their first victory in overtime since the 2005 conference matchup against the

Troy Trojans The Troy Trojans are the sports teams of Troy University. They began playing in the NCAA's Division I-A in 2001, became a football only member of the Sun Belt Conference in 2004, and joined that conference for all other sports in 2005. Troy Univer ...

. During Week 14, Louisiana was ranked for the first time ever in the

College Football Playoff The College Football Playoff (CFP) is an annual postseason knockout invitational tournament to determine a national champion for the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS), the highest level ...

rankings, at No. 25. This was also the first time the Cajuns had been ranked in the three major college football rankings (No. in the 20 AP Poll, No. 21 in the

Coaches Poll The Coaches Poll is a weekly ranking of the top 25 NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) college football, Division I college basketball, and Division I college baseball teams. The football version of the poll has been known officiall ...

, and No. 25 in the CFP rankings). During Week 14, the Cajuns defeated Appalachian State for the first time in school history, bringing their all-time record against the Mountaineers to 1–8. The Cajuns ended their season by defeating the

UTSA Roadrunners The UTSA Roadrunners is a collegiate athletic program that represents the University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA). The UTSA Roadrunners are also commonly referred to as "UTSA", "Roadrunners", "Runners", “The Meep Meeps”, or simply “The B ...

in the

2020 First Responder Bowl The 2020 First Responder Bowl was a college football bowl game played on December 26, 2020, with kickoff at 3:30 p.m. EST (2:30 p.m. local CST) on ABC. It was the 11th edition of the First Responder Bowl, and was one of the 2020–21 ...

. Senior RB

Elijah Mitchell Elijah I. Mitchell (born May 2, 1998) is an American football running back for the San Francisco 49ers of the National Football League (NFL). He played college football at Louisiana. Early life and high school Mitchell grew up in Erath, Louisi ...

earned the bowl game MVP. This also marked the first time a Sun Belt team took part in that bowl game. Shortly before the season began, Offensive Line Assistant Coach D. J. Looney, 31, died of a heart attack while at practice on August 1, 2020. He was honored at the Week 9 matchup against UAB in his hometown of

Birmingham, Alabama Birmingham ( ) is a city in the north central region of the U.S. state of Alabama. Birmingham is the seat of Jefferson County, Alabama's most populous county. As of the 2021 census estimates, Birmingham had a population of 197,575, down 1% fr ...

, where players all wore Looney's name on their jerseys.

Preseason

Recruiting class

Source:

Award watch lists

Listed in the order that they were released

Preseason

Sources:

Sun Belt coaches poll

The Sun Belt coaches poll was released on July 20, 2021. The Cajuns were picked to finish first in the West Division and first in the conference.

Sun Belt Preseason All-Conference teams

Offense ''1st team'' *O'Cyrus Torrence – Offensive Lineman, SO ''2nd team'' * Levi Lewis – Quarterback, SR *Max Mitchell – Offensive Lineman, JR Defense ''1st team'' *Bralen Trahan – Defensive Back, RS-JR ''2nd team'' *Zi'Yon Hill – Defensive Lineman, RS-JR *Lorenzo McCaskill – Linebacker, RS-JR *Eric Garror – Defensive Back, JR Special Teams ''1st team'' *Rhys Byrns – Punter, JR * Chris Smith – Return Specialist, RS-SO

Personnel

Schedule

The 2021 schedule consists of 6 home and 6 away games in the regular season. The Ragin' Cajuns will travel to Sun Belt foes Georgia Southern,

South Alabama South Alabama is the various parts of southern Alabama. Although it is not a strictly defined geographic region, it generally includes all Alabama counties south of the Black Belt (region of Alabama), Black Belt. In that view, ''South Alabama'' co ...

Arkansas State Arkansas ( ) is a landlocked state in the South Central United States. It is bordered by Missouri to the north, Tennessee and Mississippi to the east, Louisiana to the south, and Texas and Oklahoma to the west. Its name is from the Osage ...

, and

Troy Troy ( el, Τροία and Latin: Troia, Hittite: 𒋫𒊒𒄿𒊭 ''Truwiša'') or Ilion ( el, Ίλιον and Latin: Ilium, Hittite: 𒃾𒇻𒊭 ''Wiluša'') was an ancient city located at Hisarlik in present-day Turkey, south-west of Ç ...

. The Cajuns will play host to Sun Belt foes Appalachian State,

Texas State Texas State University is a public research university in San Marcos, Texas. Since its establishment in 1899, the university has grown to the second largest university in the Greater Austin metropolitan area and the fifth largest university ...

, Georgia State, and Louisiana–Monroe. The Ragin' Cajuns will host two of the three non-conference opponents at

, Nicholls, from

NCAA Division I FCS The NCAA Division I Football Championship Subdivision (FCS), formerly known as Division I-AA, is the second-highest level of college football in the United States, after the Football Bowl Subdivision. Sponsored by the National Collegiate Athletic ...

and

Ohio Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...

of the

Mid-American Conference The Mid-American Conference (MAC) is a National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) NCAA Division I, Division I collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference with a membership base in the Great Lakes region (North America), Great L ...

, and will travel to

of the

and

Liberty Liberty is the ability to do as one pleases, or a right or immunity enjoyed by prescription or by grant (i.e. privilege). It is a synonym for the word freedom. In modern politics, liberty is understood as the state of being free within society fr ...

, a FBS Independent.

Game summaries

at Texas

Nicholls

Ohio

at Georgia Southern

at South Alabama

Appalachian State

at Arkansas State

Texas State

Georgia State

at Troy

at Liberty

Louisiana–Monroe

Appalachian State (SBC Championship)

vs. Marshall (New Orleans Bowl)

Rankings

References

{{Sun Belt Conference football champions

Louisiana Louisiana , group=pronunciation (French: ''La Louisiane'') is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It is the 20th-smallest by area and the 25th most populous of the 50 U.S. states. Louisiana is borde ...

Louisiana Ragin' Cajuns football seasons Sun Belt Conference football champion seasons New Orleans Bowl champion seasons Louisiana Ragin' Cajuns football