Just call them the Space Cowboys.

At least for one night McNeese State will be that.

Hey, it beats space cadets.

The Cowboys will take part in a special game honoring NASA and the race to the moon Saturday night when they travel to Houston for their first meeting with Rice.

The Owls are going all in as they celebrate the 60th anniversary of John F. Kennedy’s famous moon speech which took place in Rice Stadium on Sept. 12, 1962.

Rice is located just a few miles from NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston and has always been closely associated with the space program.

With that in mind, the Owls unveiled their special shiny uniforms which they will wear for the game.

“There are a lot of cool things happening this week,” Rice head coach Mike Bloomgren said.

Rice will wear white and silver jerseys that will have portions of Kennedy’s speech on their shoulder pads. Bloomgren said they will look like space suits and honor not only the trips already made to the moon but also those upcoming in NASA’s Artemis program.

“We are going to look good and our stadium is going to look good,” Bloomgren said.

Rice Stadium is in the process of getting a makeover as well.

While that is great for Rice, McNeese head coach Gary Goff is simply thinking football as the Cowboys help the Owls open their home season.

“They just told us we were going to be wearing our blue jerseys,” Goff said. “We are just excited to be going over there and playing them. I hear they are going to be wearing cool uniforms, which is good for them.”

The Cowboys (0- 1) are hoping to have learned from last week’s season-opening loss at Montana State by cleaning a few things up on both sides of the football.

“There were some positives,” Goff said. “Our players saw that if you play hard for a full game then you can stay in games.”

One area that needs to improve against the 0-1 Owls is on third down. McNeese was 2 of 10 in those situations on offense, leaving the defense exposed on the field.

“We have got to do a better job on third downs and that starts with being better on first and second downs,” Goff said.

Knox Kadum will be the starting quarterback again this week after a mixed bag in his Cowboys debut. Kadum was 11 of 21 for 126 yards one score and two interceptions in Montana.

Goff against said quarterback Cam Ransom will also play.

“Cam will have a package and we will continue to increase his package as we move forward,” Goff said.

That forward process starts Saturday at Rice as McNeese looks to shoot for the stars against a Football Bowl Subdivision foe on a night the teams celebrate racing to the moon.