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Dennis Denicola was five years old when LSU won its first national championship in college football, capping an undefeated season with a 7-0 victory over Clemson in the Sugar Bowl on Jan. 1, 1959. He had to wait 45 years for the Tigers to win a second title, culminating a one-loss season with a 21-14 victory over Oklahoma in the Sugar Bowl on Jan. 4, 2004.

Denicola has only had to wait four years to see LSU play for its third championship. “I’m just in a daze that it happened so quick,” he says. “It’s good for the whole state when LSU is doing good.”

But Denicola has a bit more of a rooting interest than the average lifelong Tiger fan living in Baton Rouge. His business, Denicola’s Tiger Den on South Harrell’s Ferry Road, sells scores of licensed LSU items, from custom-made furniture to ceramics and from T-shirts to Christmas ornaments.

The phones at the Tiger Den haven’t stopped ringing since Dec. 2, when it was announced that LSU would face off against Ohio State in the BCS Championship game, which will be played Jan. 7 in the Louisiana Superdome. And when the Tigers win—Denicola didn’t say “if”—he says the store will be even busier.

“Sales are up a little bit, but people will be spending more after we win,” he says. “We’ve been selling at a steady pace, and that will extend into February when we win.”

Businesses across Baton Rouge that piggyback off LSU football, such as Denicola’s Tiger Den, are looking at a championship game windfall for the second time this decade. Some companies have even rented additional storage space to hold all of the purple-and-gold merchandise they expect to move in the weeks following the game.

“It will be pandemonium for several days,” says Alan Wallace, general manager of Tiger Mania. “Tuesday morning, people will be waiting at the door for us to open. It will be like a game day for several days.”

It’s difficult to determine how much pull the game will have on LSU’s fundraising efforts. School officials say there are obviously no downsides to the national attention and good feelings generated by a championship season, but it’s also tough to point to specific benefits.

Athletic Director Skip Bertman says the economic impact of the football team and other sports programs is spread across the city. He says the Tigers help generate more than $150 million a year into the Capital Region economy. “That’s not just hotels and restaurants,” Bertman says. “That’s every small business owner all the way up to Dillard’s. If we win, people feel better.”

While winning a second championship in four years would solidify LSU’s standing as one of the most dominant college football programs, Bertman says it might not have as much of a financial impact on the university.

“There’s no causable proof that if we win, we get better fundraising,” he says.

LSU had a record-setting fundraising year in 2006, bringing in more than $120 million. Donations are currently running about 10% ahead of the pace, Chancellor Sean O’Keefe says. But O’Keefe says a lot of factors drive donations, such as a healthy economy. After all, if alumni can’t afford to write a check to the school, it doesn’t matter if the football team has 11 wins or two.

“People are in a better frame of mind and when you have opportunities to talk to prospective donors, it makes it easier to get through the first five minutes of the conversation when people are talking about an exciting game instead of complaining about what happened,” he says.

O’Keefe says that good buzz caused by a No. 1 ranking pales in comparison to bigger factors. For example, last year the Legislature came close to passing a bill sponsored by state Sen. Bill Cassidy, a Baton Rouge Republican, that would have accelerated how people take tax credits for making a contribution to a college. “That, more than anything, would have boosted donor participation,” O’Keefe says.

Bertman says while LSU has done a lot better in terms of fundraising over the past three years, he doesn’t know how much the Tigers’ 2003 national championship played a part.

“The only thing we can point a finger at is the licensing,” he says.

LSU now collects a 10% royalty on the wholesale cost of any officially licensed item, from T-shirts to fine art prints. The university was collecting 8%, but the higher rate went into effect on Jan. 1, 2008. LSU brought in nearly $1 million in licensing the year before it won the national championship, which set a record for the university.

That mark was shattered in the 2004 fiscal year, when the school got nearly $3 million in royalties, including $1.1 million just for national merchandise, says Brian Hommel, LSU’s director of trademark licensing.

For the 2003-04 fiscal year, the Tigers ranked fifth among schools whose items are sold through Atlanta-based Collegiate Licensing Company. LSU ranked No. 10 on royalties reported during the first quarter of 2007-08, from July 1-Sept. 30, when the football team was second in most polls.

For the fiscal year ending in June, LSU generated more than $3 million in licensing royalties, setting another record. The combination of a higher rate and a championship-quality football season should cause a new record to be set this current year, Hommel says. “But you don’t really get the big payout unless you win the championship,” he says.

If the Tigers beat Ohio State, the payoff will be even better, because the royalty rate for BCS-licensed gear is 12%. That means a win could result in $4 million for the university, Bertman says.

One of the intangible benefits of the game is the fact that LSU will get four hours of exposure on prime-time television, thanks to Fox’s coverage of the BCS Championship Series. More than 58 million Americans watched last year’s championship game between Florida and Ohio State in Glendale, Ariz., according to figures from Nielsen Media Research.

That national exposure should help boost the number of students who apply to attend LSU. After the Tigers won the 2003 national championship, more than 11,000 students applied to attend the university, setting a record, O’Keefe says.

That record was broken last year, when about 11,500 students filled out applications. O’Keefe says the numbers are “several hundred ahead” of where they were this time last year. “There’s a big difference in seeing LSU play in a game and clicking on a Web site and actually filling out an application,” O’Keefe says. “This isn’t drive-by interest.”

Bertman cautioned that the increased interest may not translate into LSU actually getting better students—or even better student-athletes. There’s no correlation between increases in applications and higher graduation rates, he says. But getting interest from more students does help the odds of landing better students.

The boost in exposure could lead to LSU rising in the U.S. News & World Report college rankings. There’s been a concentrated push by the university and the Baton Rouge Area Chamber of Commerce to improve the school’s standing. After the Legislature voted during the past session to raise LSU’s student appropriation level to the national average, that put LSU on the same standing as universities such as Tennessee, Maryland and Arizona State. The increased attention caused by the football success could raise LSU’s standing among other state schools and cause more people to look at other good things going on at the university, O’Keefe says. “There’s a much higher visibility of our university today among our peers because of these events,” he says. “That’s nothing but positive.”

The Baton Rouge Area Convention & Visitors Bureau is hoping the higher visibility of LSU leads to more tourism business.

The CVB launched a public-relations and advertising campaign in markets across Ohio, Georgia, Hawaii—three states which are sending teams to New Orleans bowl games—and cities where there are a significant number of LSU graduates, promoting Baton Rouge’s easy access to New Orleans, the direct flights that come into Metro Airport and the thousands of affordable, available hotel rooms.

The campaign involves advertising on university and local newspaper Web sites. “You take a city like Baton Rouge, with about 10,000 hotel rooms in the area. If we can fill 1,500 rooms, that’s 15% of the market, which is pretty significant for the first week of January,” says Paul Arrigo, president and CEO of the CVB.

Arrigo says the Capital Region has a better chance to lure in some of the people heading to the BCS Championship Game this time around than it did for the 2004 Sugar Bowl. This year, New Orleans hotels have raised their rates and are requiring three-night minimum stays because of all the demand caused by having the Sugar Bowl, the annual meeting of the American Economic Association and the BCS Championship Game happening within the same week.

“If you’re trying to get a hotel room in New Orleans, there’s a three night minimum and the rates are $400 to $500 a night,” Arrigo says. “We’re hoping to pick up one night that we wouldn’t have normally picked up in 2004.”

Arrigo isn’t the only person expecting to do more business from LSU’s national championship hunt this time around. Tricia Screen, general manager of Ivar’s Sports Bar & Grill, says the Perkins Road restaurant is expecting to sell more food and drinks, since the BCS Championship is being played on a Monday night. In 2004, the game was played on a Sunday, so Ivar’s had to close at midnight. This year, Ivar’s will stay open until 2 a.m., so fans returning from the championship game will be able to stop off for a nightcap. “People have been calling here for reservations ever since the game was announced,” she says. “It’s going to be a zoo. It’s all anyone can talk about.”

Pat Randazza, owner of the Purple and Gold Sports Shop in Hammond Aire Plaza, says if LSU manages to win its second national championship in four years, sales will top the records from early 2004. “Profit-wise, things aren’t as good as this time in 2003,” she says.

Randazza says LSU’s stressful season, which included comeback victories over Florida, Auburn, Alabama and Tennessee and triple-overtime losses to Kentucky and Arkansas as well as the specter of Coach Les Miles leaving for Michigan, played a part.

“It was difficult for the fans to get through all of that, but things keep on getting better and better every day,” she says. “But sales will top 2003-2004 if we win it twice.”