Today is a special day for Ken Hale, Brittany Goss, Charles Joseph and all the other long-suffering members of Who Dat Nation.

In Gainesville, as across America, former residents of New Orleans and the surrounding region are rallying together with the Saints' bizarre battle cry of "Who Dat!" as they prepare for the biggest game of the 43-year-old NFL franchise's history: Super Bowl XLIV.

"Here it comes," said Hale, 37, who grew up a Saints fan in Lexington, Miss., and stayed one when he moved to Gainesville in the late 1980s. "It's time."

Longtime, diehard Saints fans feel a bond strengthened by their team's well-documented history of futility.
After the Saints were founded in 1967, they went more than a decade before having a season with a .500 record, and two decades before having a winning season. The team didn't win a playoff game until 2000, and it took more than four decades to reach the Super Bowl.

Hale remembers some of those bad old days well.

"We watched the games and were happy if we got a field goal and didn't get blown out or (quarterback) Archie (Manning) didn't get hurt," Hale said.

"I wish my dad and granddad had lived to see this," Hale said. "It's something we thought would never happen — it was like, ‘when pigs fly' — when the Saints win the Super Bowl."

Flowery Branch's Charles Joseph, 49, grew up in New Orleans and remembers hearing the roar that erupted from Tulane Stadium five miles from his home when the Saints' Tom Dempsey kicked an NFL-record 63-yard field goal in 1970.

"It felt like an earthquake," Joseph said.

Joseph also remembered enduring the year-in, year-out era of the "'Aints," when fans in the stands wore brown paper sacks over their heads in protest of the team's dismal performance.

"It was one of those deals where we loved it because it was all we had," Joseph said. "It was tough, but not one time did I think about abandoning them, because I knew one day they were going to get there."

Kent Murphey spent 13 years in the New Orleans area before moving to Gainesville in 1992. As a student at New Orleans Seminary in the 1980s, he went to games when tickets were literally given away outside the Superdome.

Tonight Murphey and his wife are throwing a Super Bowl party for five other couples, all ministers, most graduates of New Orleans Seminary.

Murphey is among those who agree the football team has helped boost the spirits of a city still recovering from the devastation of Hurricane Katrina nearly five years ago.

"I'm happy to see the city have a reason for pride after that," Murphey said.

Said Kelly Russo, a New Orleans native who moved to Gainesville in 2005, "this is a like a huge breath of fresh air, a wind in the sail - it's amazing."

"We're all hitting our heads and asking, ‘is this really happening?" Russo said. "We're all feeling slap happy."

Brittany Goss, 34, grew up in New Iberia, La. before moving to Gainesville in 1988 and is a lifelong fan of the Saints. Aside from her parents, most of her family still lives in Louisiana.

This year she's been getting long-distance reports from the games, and the team's heroics have had her phone lighting up with text messages and pictures from back home.

"It's all, ‘Who Dat?' and ‘Who Dat Nation,'" Goss said. "Everybody's just on fire. It is so exciting. I can't wait until Sunday."

Said Joseph, "It's euphoria, it's great. Now, it would be better if they win. I feel great about their chances."

It's not just folks with ties to New Orleans and the Delta region who have a rooting interest in the Saints.

Maybe because of Katrina, or maybe because people just think they're due, the Saints are attracting a lot of latecomers to the party.

Hale said he welcomes any new fans who have decided to jump on the bandwagon.

"Come on," he said. "There's plenty of room. We don't have to all stand in the same place on Bourbon Street."