Mike Serio has seen an awful lot of LSU games, but nothing like this season

NEW ORLEANS – Mike Serio has seen a lot of LSU football games.

A whole lot.

The last 451 – home and away – to be exact. That goes back to October of 1983.

He has seen every game in Tiger Stadium since the start of the 1971 season.

He has seen the glory days of Charlie McClendon, Bert Jones, Tommy Casanova. A bunch of bowl games. He has seen the Tigers win two national championships. He has seen Nick Saban coach LSU to the first of those championships and seen Saban deny the Tigers a third as head coach at Alabama.

He has seen LSU play games at Notre Dame, North Carolina, Virginia, Virginia Tech, Arizona, Arizona State, Southern California, Washington and historic Lambeau Field in Green Bay, Wisc.

And every SEC venue except Missouri. (That’s coming up in 2023).

And more.

“We live, breathe, eat, sleep LSU,” Serio said. “It’s a lifestyle.”

Serio has seen just about everything LSU football has to offer.

But he has never seen anything like this season.

Ever.

“It’s mind boggling,” Serio said this week as the No. 1-ranked Tigers prepare to face No. 3 Clemson in the College Football Playoff Championship Game on Monday night in the Mercedes-Benz Superdome.

Undefeated. SEC champions. First CFP appearance. One win from a national championship.

And just the second Heisman Trophy winner in LSU history – and a quarterback (Joe Burrow) for crying out loud. An LSU quarterback?

“Phenomenal,” Serio said. “This is a different level, a different game. It’s high tech.”

Business has been picking up at Mike Serio’s Po-Boys on St. Charles Avenue downtown as the big game approaches. After logging all those thousands of miles to watch LSU play all over the country, the final game of this unique LSU football season will be played within walking distance of Serio’s business.

“How can you beat that?” Serio said.

He began frequenting LSU home games when he and his brother tagged along with their great uncle, Mitchell Serio, as youngsters.

The last time LSU played a football game in Tiger Stadium and Serio wasn’t there was in 1970 when the Tigers routed Ole Miss, 61-17. It was a legendary night as LSU got revenge on Archie Manning and the Rebels for upsetting them the previous two seasons.

Manning played with a cast on his broken left arm, the Tigers ran three punts back for touchdowns, Ronnie Estay sacked Manning for a safety and LSU was off to the Orange Bowl.

There were lots of memorable moments that night. Serio wasn’t there to witness them, but nothing memorable has happened in Tiger Stadium since that he hasn’t witnessed.

“I’ve been pretty fortunate health wise,” Serio said. “If I get sick I make sure it’s in July or August. There’s nothing happening in July or August.”

Serio advises friends and relatives to get married – if, in fact, they must – in the summer as well: “I don’t go to weddings during football season.”

He has been married twice himself and has a child from each – his son, Mickey, who’s 38, and his daughter, Madeline, who’s 18. Her birth nearly put the streak in jeopardy.

It was the 2001 season and Patti Serio was due at the end of December. LSU was a candidate to play in the Rose Bowl, which would have created a troublesome cross-country trip around the due date.

As it turned out, the Tigers would up in the Sugar Bowl, Madeline was born on Dec. 28 and on New Year’s night Serio was where he belonged – in the Superdome watching LSU thrash Illinois.

“That was kind of close,” Serio said.

His determination to see the Tigers was revealed even before the streak began. In 1969 LSU was hosting Auburn and star quarterback Pat Sullivan in a Saturday afternoon game on ABC. No one else had much interest in traveling to Baton Rouge to see a game that was on TV, especially for a day game in Tiger Stadium.

“I’m going to the game,” Serio told the couch potatoes.

So 18-year-old Mike Serio bought himself a ticket on a Greyhound bus, rode up to Baton Rouge and watched the game by himself.

“I rode home with somebody I ran into,” Serio said.

The streak could have ended in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina at the start of the 2005 season. The Tigers season opener against North Texas in Tiger Stadium was canceled.

The LSU campus was still being used as a triage and staging area for rescue operations as the Tigers were scheduled to host Arizona State on the second weekend, so that game was moved to Tempe, Ariz.

New Orleans was under water and without electricity so Serio’s restaurant was temporarily out of business. “I had time on my hands,” Serio said.

New Orleans International Airport was closed so it was a little tricky for Serio to find a way to get to Arizona – other than making the 1,500-mile drive. He tried to hitch a ride on the LSU equipment truck.

“It was booked up,” Serio said.

Mickey Serio was a senior at LSU and his mother, Marcia, was remarried and living in Phoenix. Marcia and Mike have remained on good terms since the divorce.

“She always said that I loved LSU more than her,” Serio said. “I told her, ‘Honey, it’s just a different kind of love.’”

Marcia, who made frequent trips back to Louisiana to visit family, had a free voucher for a flight on Southwest Airlines. She offered it to Mike, who drove to Houston to catch a flight to see the Tigers beat the Sun Devils in Les Miles’ first game as a head coach.

Two years later, Miles would coach the Tigers to their most recent national championship.

Now here we are with LSU on the cusp of another national title. In the Superdome. Just like in 2003. Just like in 2007. Just like the one that got away against Saban and Alabama in 2011.

The Serios family has always been close with the Cannon family. Among the LSU memorabilia on display in the restaurant is an LSU helmet with Cannon’s autograph next to his number 20.

Cannon won the Heisman Trophy after the 1958 season. On May 20, 2018 Cannon passed away at age 80, within hours of Burrow first setting foot on the LSU campus.

“You wonder, how did we get this guy?” Serio said. “It’s fate.”

Last month, Burrow joined Cannon as LSU’s only Heisman Trophy winners, doing so by a record margin.

LSU arrived in town Friday evening and Serio loves to host the Tigers at his restaurant when the team is in New Orleans, but don’t look for head coach Ed Orgeron, Burrow or anyone else from the team to be there even though the LSU hotel on Canal Street is just a couple of blocks from the restaurant.

“This isn’t a bowl game; they’re not going out sight-seeing,” Serio said. “They’re focused in on the game Monday night. They’re here for a mission. That mission is to come home with a national championship. That’s what I love.”

Serio said one of his favorite moments from this season was the first big test for the Tigers. Second game of the season. Number nine Texas. On the road in Austin.

“Big-time atmosphere,” Serio said.

LSU hadn’t played the Longhorns since 1954. “I didn’t make it to that game,” Serio quipped. “I was three.”

But Burrow made play after play after play and the Tigers won 45-38, announcing to the college football world that this LSU quarterback was different, this offense was different, this team was different.

This season was different.

Serio said he’s “not discounting” Clemson. That group of Tigers is undefeated too. It has won 29 straight games. Won last year’s national championship, its second in three years.

But …

“I’ve got so much confidence in that kid,” Serio said of Burrow.

And when the game ends the way Serio believes it inevitably will, “we should put up a new statue (of Burrow) on Tuesday.”

Serio recalled one of the most memorable nights of his life – one of the few not involving LSU football – “July 20, 1969, my 18th birthday.”

That’s when man first set foot on the moon.

Serio turned his attention back to an LSU season unlike any other.

“It just keeps getting better and better,” Serio said. “It’s not a roller-coaster ride. It’s like riding on the Space Shuttle – and on Jan. 13, 2020 we’re going to land on the moon.”