D1 College Football News

February 5 , 2007

Source: The National Football Foundation & College Hall of Fame, Inc.


Third Annual Run for Pat Tillman Foundation Scheduled

The Pat Tillman Foundation will host the third annual Pat's Run in Tempe, Ariz., on Apr. 7, 2007, at Sun Devil Stadium while the second annual San Jose, Calif., run will be held Sunday, Apr. 29, 2007, at Pat Tillman Stadium at Leland High School.

Last year's event in Tempe drew nearly 10,000 participants. Almost 5,000 people were part of the inaugural Pat's Run in San Jose.

Two-Minute Drill

Stephen F. Austin will have juice and doughnuts as the first letters-of-intent are faxed into Nacogdoches, Texas, and will allow supporters to visit and watch signing proceedings throughout Wednesday (lunch also will be served at the football office) until the last letter is received... South Florida was honored for its bowl win over East Carolina at last week’s USF-Notre Dame basketball contest... Georgia offensive coordinator Mike Bobo joined head coaches Jim Tressel of Ohio State, Bobby Bowden of Florida State and Mike Stoops of Arizona at the annual Atlanta Coach of the Year Coaches Clinic. The clinic was founded over 40 years ago by NFF Hall of Fame coaches Duffy Daugherty of Michigan State and Bud Wilkinson of Oklahoma. The clinic is directed by Chuck Rohe and NFF Hall of Famer Johnny Majors... Montana will hold its spring football game in Billings, Mont., on April 14... Fresno State agreed to a home- and-home series with Cincinnati starting in 2009. The Bulldogs’ also scheduled their first-ever meeting with Texas A&M (Sept. 8, 2007) and will open the 2008 season against UCLA in the Rose Bowl.

A task force of Division I Football Issues Committee members will be appointed by the NCAA to address several topics, including non-scholastic camps and clinics, coaches making on- campus contact in the spring with prospective student-athletes and with those who have already signed a National Letter of Intent, and the possible establishment of an early signing date.

Kansas State head coach Ron Prince promoted 1996 NFF National Scholar- Athlete Tim Tibesar to defensive coordinator... Mississippi extended the existing contract of head coach Ed Orgeron two years... Memphis assistant head coach Clay Helton has been promoted to offensive coordinator... Livingstone (N.C.) named Lamonte Massie as the 33rd head coach... Shawn Watson has been promoted to offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach at Nebraska... Pat Cerroni has been named interim head football coach at Wisconsin- Oshkosh... Volunteer assistant football coach Ryan Leaf, who led Washington State to the 1998 Rose Bowl, has added head men’s golf coach to his duties at West Texas A&M... Kentucky head coach Rich Brooks has finalized a four-year contract with a fifth-season option. All UK assistants also received raises and two-year contracts... Central Michigan hired Dave Lawson as its director of strength and conditioning... Kevin Clark was named head coach at Edward Waters College (Fla.)... Hal Wasson has become head coach at Southlake (Texas) Carroll HS, which has won four national championships in the last five years and 79 of its last 80 games... Idaho has chosen Mark Criner as defensive coordinator... California has named Jim Michalczik offensive coordinator.

College Football Hall of Famer Fred Biletnikoff, who played for Florida State from 1962-1964, retired on Jan. 30 as the Oakland Raiders' wide receivers coach after spending more than three decades as a player and coach for the franchise.

Dr. Lee McElroy, vice president for athletic administration and director of intercollegiate athletics at Albany, received a new five-year appointment running through 2011. He has pledged to continue the effort to build an on-campus stadium at the New York university... Rogers Redding, coordinator of officials for the Southeastern Conference, has been named secretary-rules editor of the NCAA Football Rules Committee... Kevin Smith was named director of the Florida Beach Sports Commission. He also serves on the Outback Bowl board of directors... Matt Wilson was named account director at the Austin Convention & Visitors Bureau, part of the Austin (Texas) Sports Commission... Bee Lee will join the AT&T Cotton Bowl Council... Learfield Marketing and the Black Coaches Association (BCA) hired Troy Arthur as the general manager of BCA Properties.

The Ivy Football Association held its fourth awards dinner on Jan. 25, honoring its 2007 Class of Honorees in front of nearly 1,400 guests in New York City. This year’s honorees included Donald Carcieri (Brown), actor Brian Dennehy (Columbia), Louis Conti (Cornell), Reggie Williams (Dartmouth), Thomas Stephenson (Harvard), Patrick Harker (Penn), Redmond Finney (Princeton) and Jerome Kenney (Yale).

1997 NFF Draddy Award recipient Peyton Manning (Tennessee) of the Indianapolis Colts captured the Super Bowl XLI Most Valuable Player Award in his first trek to the ultimate NFL challenge... Chris Plonsky, NFF board member and Texas director of women's athletics and men's & women's athletics external services, has been named the Kent State Athletic Distinguished Alumnus for 2007... The Sugar Bowl Committee along with the Manning family announced that LSU’s JaMarcus Russell was selected as this year's recipient of the Manning Award, given to the nation’s top college quarterback... Rick Ranucci, the NFF’s 2006 Northeast Regional Chapter Leadership Award winner, was recently honored as a recipient of the Eastern College Athletic Conference’s Red Hill Award. The award recognizes the ECAC Football Officials of the Year... Retired Elon director of athletics Alan White, a standout running back at Wake Forest and AD at Elon the final 27 years (1979-2006) of his college administrative career, was selected for the North Carolina Sports Hall of Fame. Also joining White in the state’s Hall of Fame were NC State football standouts Claude Gibson and Dennis Byrd... The Colorado Chapter of the NFF will hold its 14th annual Scholar-Athlete Banquet on Feb. 19 in Denver with former Colorado QB and FSN Rocky Mountain analyst Joel Klatt as master of ceremonies. Retired Air Force head coach Fisher DeBerry will receive the Joe Kearney Service Award, and new Air Force mentor Troy Calhoun will be the guest speaker... Hawaii’s Colt Brennan received the Sammy Baugh Award, presented annually to the nation's top passer by the Touchdown Club of Columbus (Ohio)... Middle Tennessee head coach Rick Stockstill has been tabbed as the Tennessee Sports Writers Association’s 2006 Coach of the Year... Boston College’s football squad is one of six teams recognized for fall semester sportsmanship by the Atlantic Coast Conference... Penn State produced 43 student-athletes with grade point averages of 3.0 or higher (4.0 scale). Two-time ESPN the Magazine CoSIDA Academic All- America and NFF Scholar-Athlete Paul Posluszny (also a two-time Butkus Award winner) paced the effort.

Several members of the College Football Hall of Fame participated in the Feb. 1 NFL/United States Congress Super Bowl XLI Celebrity Bowling Classic, including Lynn Swann (USC), Harry Carson (South Carolina State), Ted Hendricks (Miami, Fla.), Carl Eller (Minnesota). The event benefited the NFL Youth Education Town program in South Florida.

Boise State president Dr. Bob Kustra denoted a 135 percent increase in online inquiries for admissions as well as soaring graduate school applications. Graduate applications have increased from four to 30-40 each day as a result of the national acclaim Boise State received for its Tostitos Fiesta Bowl BCS triumph over Oklahoma. 2007 also marks BSU’s 75th anniversary of its founding... Albany County, Wyo., raised $409,218 during the Wyoming Cowboy Joe Club fund-raising blitz for a school record after the county raised $322,940 in 2005... Drew Butler, the son of Kevin Butler who is the only kicker in the College Football Hall of Fame, will follow in his father’s footsteps. The Peachtree Ridge High School punter has committed to sign with Georgia and head coach Mark Richt Wednesday... Staff Sgt. Patrick Clark, a former Southern Illinois football student- athlete; and Spc. Dana Pinkston, assistant media relations director at Southeast Missouri; currently are deployed with Army National Guard units in Iraq... Chip Smith, athletics director at Western Carolina, announced plans to organize a task force to survey the school’s football program... South Carolina is negotiating with Under Armour to possibly make the manufacturer the official uniform provider for the Gamecocks... The University of Texas Intercollegiate Athletics Department is giving $2.5 million to the university for academic purposes.

Florida International University (FIU) has received permission to fund a $31 million football stadium renovation. The local bond issue includes 10,500 additional seats, 14 luxury suites, a warp- around concourse, 1,400 club seats, a new scoreboard, stadium club, and 100,000-square foot student center within the new football property... Florida has received approval for a $28 million facility improvement project – Phase One will be a new weight room at Ben Hill Griffin Stadium... Colorado will keep season ticket prices for 2007 at 2006 levels and has eliminated more than 2,000 seats from the required donor seating area... Washington has already received deposits for 600 new season tickets for the 2007 season... Louisville hired local architectural firm Luckett & Farley and Atlanta’s Rosser International to run its $65 million stadium expansion project.

Oregon State will travel to Cincinnati for a Thursday ESPN outing with the Bearcats... Rutgers and Navy have moved their contest to Friday, Sept. 7, to accommodate a national telecast on ESPN... Washington and Syracuse will meet on Friday, Aug. 31, in an ESPN national broadcast from the Carrier Dome... Fresno State’s game with Kansas State was changed to Nov. 24 to accommodate ESPN scheduling... The Big East Conference has secured 10 Thursday-Friday-Saturday telecasts (with more to come) on the ESPN family of networks for 2007... The Patriot League has partnered with Daktronics, Inc. , of Brookings, S.D., for electronic scoreboards, programmable displays, video displays at football facilities, and additional services... Davis Entertainment, in the midst of producing a movie on the life of 1979 College Football Hall of Famer and 1961 Heisman Trophy winner Ernie Davis, met with Syracuse director of athletics Dr. Daryl Gross and other dignitaries to brief the university on the progress of the soon-to-be-released motion picture... Online auction group eBay bought sports ticket reseller StubHub for $310 million. One of the key investors in the transaction was Steve Young, former Brigham Young All-America QB and 2001 NFF College Football Hall of Fame inductee... West Texas A&M assistant Ryan Leaf will be featured on an upcoming episode of ESPN’s “Outside the Lines” . The segment will also feature head coach Don Carthel and QB Keith Null... XOS Technologies will partner with Nevada to implement a turnkey solution for its athletics team and upgrade ticketing technology.

The Football Writers Association of America (FWAA) is now accepting entries for its annual best writing contest. For more information and complete entry procedures, go to www.fwaa.com. You must be an FWAA member in good standing to qualify, and the deadline is July 1.

Tom Powers, 77, Duke’s single game record holder for touchdowns (six) and points (36) in 1950 vs. Richmond, died in California... Bill Bradshaw, 75, a Bowling Green Athletic Hall of Fame member, passed away on Jan. 29. He was the first punter in NCAA history to lead the nation in that statistic in consecutive seasons.