After taking one look at South Dakota State football’s equipment truck, you can only imagine the hours of loading and preparation necessary to get everything in that truck from Brookings to Frisco, Texas, the site of Sunday’s FCS national championship.

The trailer that dons the Jackrabbits’ signature blue and gold helped transport extra helmets, shoulder pads, the coaching communication system and practice equipment, among other things. The team brought everything they’d need on a typical away trip but more of everything, just in case.

After all, SDSU did practice in Texas a couple of times leading up to Sunday’s game. So all the practice gear had to make the trip too.

“We’d rather overpack for a trip like this than underpack,” South Dakota State equipment manager Aaron Crowell said.

Surprisingly, Crowell said the actual loading took only a combined two hours on Tuesday and Wednesday. Crowell has been the team’s equipment manager since 2022, so this was his second time planning and making the trip to Frisco with the team.

Crowell originally wanted to be a college football player after enjoying playing in his senior year of high school, but opted to look for a manager position instead. He reached out to Southeast Missouri State and was later hired as a student assistant. Being on campus and at practices made him quickly realize he was nowhere near the level of the athletes on the team.

He considered pursuing coaching and was even a student assistant for the defensive line but he quickly realized equipment was his calling.

“The more and more I was working, the more and more I fell in love with equipment,” Crowell said. “Just getting to work on the helmets, getting to interact with the players, just getting to be around the team. Like I just love that aspect of it, that I realized this was what I want to do.” 

Before accepting the equipment manager position with SDSU, Crowell worked as an intern at Louisiana Monroe and then as assistant equipment manager at James Madison.

Crowell’s first trip to Frisco, during his first year on the job, was understandably stress-filled. It was his first time having to plan a trip of that magnitude, but he received plenty of help and guidance from Jonathan Shaeffer, SDSU’s director of football operations.

“It’s a whole new experience trying to plan for multiple days of travel and practice, outside of just, you know, you’re not preparing for a normal away game,” Crowell said. “So, my stress levels were kind of high because I’ve never done something or experienced something like that but luckily, we have a lot of great people on the staff that were able to help me along as well, and help me kind of understand it, and really kind of helped put my nerves to ease.”

Although it’s different from a regular season road game, Crowell said he and his team approached loading the truck in a pretty similar way, which helped them load everything pretty quickly. Between him and five others, they got everything in the truck in no time.

Now in his second year with the Jackrabbits, Crowell is still stressed about everything the trip entails with his work but with the year of experience under his belt, he’s trying to take in how special it is to be on this journey with the team.

“For the most part, my stress level, since we’ve been here, has been pretty low. Everything has been nice and smooth,” Crowell said. “Last year, I was so stressed about everything and worrying about everything, I didn’t really get to soak in the moment. It’s felt really good to enjoy this experience for what it is and so that’s something that I’ve tried to try to focus on.”

Jonathan Fernandez covers high school and college sports for the Argus Leader. Contact him at jfernandez1@argusleader.com. Follow him on Twitter at @JFERN31