The Tims are doing there best to promote UCA sports by being the guys who not only go to nearly every game they can, but go shirtless with purple and gray writing all over their bodies. But the games aren’t the only place these guys are fans; they’ve also been doing their best to make themselves known in cyberspace as the leaders of the Purple Haze Army.
“The Purple Haze Army is a group dedicated to the defense and protection of the University of Central Arkansas from any who by claim, action or allegiance are enemies of the University of Central Arkansas,” says the mission statement on the at top of the page of the facebook group. But how they go about defending and protecting UCA is a little unorthodox.
The Purple Haze Army is a facebook group, presently consisting of 599 UCA students, that harasses adversaries by poking opposing athletes, causing the victim to have to click on each individual poke to clear their facebook profile. And when you get poked by 600 people, it could take a while to get rid of those. But the goal of the group is not only to aggravate the opposition, but also to get UCA students fired up about the Bears and Sugar Bears.
“We go to basketball games and we realize there’s not really that big of a fan base there, it’s kinda disappointing,” Daulong said. “I was disappointed because in high school it was like standing room only. So I was really pumped about coming to college and then we got here and there’s really not that big of a fan base. So we just wanted to find a way to reach out to the rest of the student body – to let them know when games are, the results of games or whatever and to somewhat terrorize other people – it just makes it fun.”
Winston said that a few people from other schools have threatened him and the Purple Haze Army, and some UCA students have messaged him disapproving of the group that some think take it over the line. One student from Harding made it known he didn’t appreciate the attack from the Winston and his army.
“One of them was very vulgar about it because I think he was really upset.” Winston said. “I can’t remember what we called him at the soccer games but he didn’t get to play much so we made fun of him a lot. He was very vulgar about it asking us how we did in the tournament. But it was an easy reply because Harding didn’t even make it to the national tournament.”
There’s not an exact science as to who the leaders of the group send a link to poke to every member of the army. Sometimes, it’s because they simply don’t like someone.
“We attend the games and we decide on a player who’s most vulnerable to poke or who did horrible, we just want to make them feel like a jackass,” Daulong said.
Daulong and Winston, both former cross country runners at UCA, came up with the name for the group by a chant their coach used to make them scream before competing: “One, two, three, Purple Haze!”
They got some help creating the group from sophomore Cody Stone, but said he couldn’t spend as much time leading the army as the Tims do once he got a girlfriend. After Stone’s downfall freshman Amir Rostampour stepped up and can be seen at the games alongside Daulong and Winston without a shirt – something the leaders of the army want to see from a lot more people with UCA’s move to Division I.
“I’m hoping like after we leave the Purple Haze Army carries on,” Daulong said. “I think that would be an awesome tradition to start. I watch like Duke basketball games and see their fan section, like everybody’s painted. That’s what I want, that’s our goal. Right now there’s only like four of us that get really painted and get right there in the action. I’m hoping we can fill the whole student section and I hope DI will give us that opportunity.”
