A Cougarfan Fan

In 1997, I started a club at BYU called Superfans. The first year, Superfans was an informal club consisting of people who signed up for weekly emails about sporting events and opportunities to serve the Athletic Department at BYU. I made and paid for the first shirts myself ($700 worth of awesome royal blue shirts). I believe we might have been the first weekly sports email at BYU (if I remember right) and we ended up with about 350 email signatures that first year. The next year, it became 1,500 paid members and a lifetime of memories.

Anyway, this isn't a post about our club and its accomplishments (I'll talk about that later). This IS a post to publicly thank one person many of you don't know about (even most of you involved with Superfans) who was one of the first supporters and contributors to Superfans and its success.

That person is long time BYU Cougar fan and friend, John Ahlander. John and I met in 1997. He heard about my club and contacted me to chat. We met up and talked for a while about what my vision was for the club at BYU and about his project, a website called, Cougarfan.com.






His site was way ahead of his time - It was the best curator of news on the internet concerning BYU sports - and still is, in my opinion. His concept was so simple and perfect. And to John's credit, it has remained true to its simple and perfect form ever since.

From the day we met, we promoted his site in our emails and he promoted our club back. It was a great compliment to our email and a great resource for fans. While Superfans came and went after 8 years, Cougarfan has kept it up without fail.

I think BYU underestimates how key his pioneering efforts have been in promoting BYU sports online and influencing other BYU sports sites - and even official BYU online efforts too. It's been great to be a visitor of his site for so many years. I still visit it almost daily.

I encourage you to give him a shout out on Twitter (@cougarfandotcom) or by email (contactus@cougarfan.com), check out his site (and the great updated design).

Thanks to you, John, for being an early believer and supporter of Superfans, and a loyal Cougar fan. You've made my experience as a fan better and you've been a good friend. Thanks for everything.

Adam