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DEL.ICIO.USCurry had itch to coach again
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
At various intersections in Bill Curry’s developing life, when he needed counsel, he turned to Bobby Dodd. Curry had been recruited by Dodd at Georgia Tech, and though that was no great coup first off, it had developed as such. Curry would become an all-star center, captain of the team and the kind of leader coaches turn to, and so it was that coach and player had a special relationship.
“I told Coach Dodd I wanted to get married,” Curry said. Dodd approved.
Near graduation time, Curry came to Dodd again. “This time I told him I wanted to be a football coach. He nearly exploded. ‘That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. You’ve got a degree from Georgia Tech. You’re capable of being an executive. Go get a job running an airline or something.’ As you can see, that time I didn’t take his advice.”
Then came the consultation that Curry feared most of all. He had been offered the job as head coach at Alabama — Alabama! — at one time Georgia Tech’s most violent rival. Curry was surprised.
“You’ve got to go,” Dodd told him. “You’ll never have a chance like that here. I love Georgia Tech, but I love you more.”
There the story began to develop horns. Many of the old Alabama guard considered Curry an intruder. To say that the Roll Tide congregation didn’t press him warmly to their bosom is severe understatement. Even winning an SEC championship — and in the course of it, the Bobby Dodd Coach of the Year Award — never calmed the waters. He still couldn’t beat Auburn, and he still bore the scent of Georgia Tech, and when the Kentucky job became open after some recruiting shenanigans, that offered the perfect escape from Tuscaloosa, a convenient solution for both the Crimson Tide and the harried Currys.
They still pumped up the footballs and basketballs with a different grade of air at Kentucky. Football ate with the servants. Curry never had a winning season, and there were other complications. While we stood together at the British Open one summer, one of his players was shot dead on a porch where he lived back in Lexington. Curry’s days at UK were already numbered, and it was a little later that he walked away from coaching, presumably for the last time.
He had known the highs and lows of football, and had sipped the nectar of it. It must not be forgotten that he was a 20th-round — rock bottom — draft choice of the Green Bay Packers, played 10 seasons in the NFL, one as president of the Players Association — not one of the more joy-filled gigs of his life — snapped the ball in three Super Bowl games, returned to Green Bay as an assistant, whereupon he was called home to Grant Field to take over a sickly program in 1980. The turnaround wasn’t the snap it might have seemed from his cockeyed upside-down position as a ball-snapper. His first two teams won a total of two games, but the major moment was a monumental tie with Notre Dame, then the No. 1-ranked team in the country. One of his teams won a bowl game and twice he beat ranked Georgia teams, but then came the Dodd equivalent of, “Get out of town before they get after you,” and he was off to Alabama.
In between Kentucky and today, Curry has worked in television, prominent on the public speaking circuit, been an educator, lived here and in North Carolina, never really dropped anchor in any field or location. George Plimpton, who did an inside look at Curry while he was a coach at Green Bay, agreed with Dodd on this level: “I always thought he should go into another line of work, like communications or politics. He is articulate, thoughtful and observant,” all of this from Plimpton’s book, “One More July.”
Curry remained, however, the restless voyager. He doesn’t say this in a precise manner, but inside there appears to have been an emotional tug of war going from the time he last hung up his whistle. “I thought a long time I’d like to coach again, but that would be unfair to Carolyn. We had grandchildren here, this was home and where she liked to be. I could hear her say, ‘Fine. Go ahead. I’ll miss you.’ “
When Mary McElroy, the athletics director at Georgia State University, called one day, he was surprised when she told him, Georgia State is about to field a football team. Fine, Curry thought, and he encouraged her.
“A huge campus in a major city with a large student body, over 100,000 alumni in this area alone, already a conference member in basketball and other sports — why, it was a natural, I told her. ‘I’ve got some good prospects for you,’ I said, thinking she was calling me about recommending a coach.’”
“No, not that,” she said. “We’d like you to be our coach.”
Dan Reeves had been called on as a consultant, “and he says we need a college guy, and you’re that guy,” McElroy said.
“I was shocked,” Curry said. “I told her I’ll call you back.”
Carolyn had to be consulted. “Oh, wonderful,” she said. “You found something you know how to do, and we don’t have to leave town.”
Curry was talking from his “headquarters,” a handy-dandy office in the athletics department. He is surrounded by veterans of the sports-intelligence trade. Charlie Taylor was Falcons information director for years. Allison George did years of service on the same level at Georgia Tech. A staff of coaching assistants is yet to be hired, if Curry can find business time away from the interviewing callers.
Where he has coached before, an athletics department has been in play for years; here, he starts at ground zero, though he suggests that the situation he walked into at Georgia Tech with Homer Rice in 1980 was barely a shade higher. At least there was a stadium, full-time facilities, a seasoned backup of alumni and student body, and a history in the game. At GSU, it’s like building an athletics program from the jockstrap up.
Where does the money come from? “There are over 100,000 alumni within a phone call, the student body has voted to share their extracurricular fee, and from this base we shall build,” Curry said.
The first class of recruits arrives next February. GSU is already a member of the Colonial Athletic Association, which means a schedule is there for the making, with such teams as Delaware, James Madison, Massachusetts and a membership aged in football, and a schedule to be filled for a season opening in 2010. But we get ahead of ourselves. Give the coach some time so he can get on with his groundwork.
Permalink | Comments (68) | Post your comment | Categories: Tech/ACC
Comments
By louis
July 12, 2008 6:14 PM | Link to this
Curry 1st class guy. Good luck
By might mike
July 12, 2008 6:55 PM | Link to this
Finally, an AJC column about football at Georgia State that doesn’t insist it’s a bad idea, as did Mr. Bradley when the school was pondering the idea — and as Mr. Moore did a few weeks ago in a column that tried to defeat logic with logic. Mr. Moore asked former basketball coach Lefty Dreisell what he thought about football at Georgia State and then countered Lefty’s quotes with his own opinions. What is it they say about facts getting in the way of a good story?
It is interesting to note that Georgia Southern’s first coach came from the University of Georgia; the other GSU’s came from Tech. I see a natural rivalry in the making here. Of course, GSU alums will have to face the challenger of being gracious and magnanimous in the face of outright scorn and derision from alums of Georgia and Georgia Tech but that will pass. I just hope the football team doesn’t disappear from the pages of the AJC as the basketball team has since Lefty departed.
Anyway, I’d like to thank Mr. Bisher for reminding me that not all sports columnists are more impressed with their own cleverness than anything else and that newspaper writers can still entertain without being obnoxious.
By mighty mike
July 12, 2008 7:13 PM | Link to this
That should have read “challenge of being gracious and magnanimous” and not “challenger of . . ” Sorry.
And while I am apologizing, sorry for not mentioning that I think Coach Curry will do a solid job at State. I enjoyed watching the Jackets while he was at Tech, especially the Black Watch defense.
By Patrick
July 12, 2008 7:55 PM | Link to this
As a GSU grad I am pretty stoked to finally have something worth cheering for! I was there when GSU went to the 2nd round of the NCAA Tournament and I firmly believe that if GSU can put a good product out there people will want to support it!
By Bob Sacamano
July 12, 2008 8:55 PM | Link to this
Isn’t GSU already Georgia Southern?
By TheBlogger
July 12, 2008 9:03 PM | Link to this
Good God! Please keep this crap off of the GA Tech web page. Curry’s current position has NOTHING to do with GA Tech. Why must the ajc do this?
By James
July 12, 2008 9:21 PM | Link to this
With Curry’s leadership State will be taking recruits from Tech in short order. The rest of Georgia’s Championship Series schools (formerly D1AA) are already shaking in their boots. State chose the right class act to start their program. Good luck folks!
By Ryan
July 12, 2008 10:01 PM | Link to this
Can’t wait. I have the fever. I’m getting season tickets for my birthday. Hell, I’ve already bought the t-shirt, hat and sweatshirt. MORE MORE MORE!!!
By Barbara Bailey
July 12, 2008 10:14 PM | Link to this
I’ve said it before and I’ll post it again…I’m a alum a few times over from GA State and this man is a class act. I’ve met him a few times; I’ve spent time talking to him; I know folks who have known him since his youth. My alma mater could not have picked a finer man with high skills to build this football program. First and foremost, he will be the kind of coach that will have character and integrity for those he coaches and those who cheer them on.
By dawgxian
July 12, 2008 10:40 PM | Link to this
wow, maybe in a few years Ga can replace Tech with State as our instate rival.
By dawgxian
July 12, 2008 10:40 PM | Link to this
wow, maybe in a few years Ga can replace Tech with State as our instate rival.
By saywhat
July 13, 2008 1:02 AM | Link to this
Curry should have been the new coach at GT. I have no idea what the idiots at Tech were thinking by not seriously considering Curry. It would have been the best thing to happen to Tech since Curry accepted the offer 30 years ago. GT will will continue to pay the price for their stupid coaching decisions.
By The Big Bug
July 13, 2008 1:15 AM | Link to this
Lousy coach at Tech.He’ll be a lousy coach at Gstate.The man was infuriating.How soon we forget.He’ll make Gailey look like Bear Bryant.State should have gotten an up and comer not a never-was old coot.
By surfrider
July 13, 2008 4:17 AM | Link to this
Good Column. That Black Watch defense of 1985 was one of the best I can remember at Tech being something like 4th in the Nation. Where did Don Lindsey end up coaching after Tech, the DC of that defense? Curry was good for Tech in rebuilding eventhough the talent was better than the record a few years. The schedule was really hard back then with not only UGA and #34 a few years but Alabama, Auburn, Florida, S.C. Tenn., Notre Dame once or twice, etc…
By wardenerd
July 13, 2008 5:33 AM | Link to this
Curry recruited the national championship team at TECH and then went to Alabama and recruited a national championship team there. DAWG fans remeber Tech won one national championship since you won yours and they do not use missing Hershel as an excuse for recent mediocrity.
By ATLfan
July 13, 2008 7:09 AM | Link to this
As the GA State football develops, and the school continues to grow, the AJC just might have to provide State its own web page.
Curry is a great choice to start and develop a program.
By Paddy
July 13, 2008 7:41 AM | Link to this
Blogger… have a little patience. GSU will have their own section soon enough. Chill for a little while, things will be ok. Have some warm milk.
By Gold and White
July 13, 2008 7:45 AM | Link to this
I am Bill Curry. I’m more honest than you. I stand taller than you. I’m smarter than you. I’m prettier than you. If you beat me its because you are a cheater. I am Bill Curry.
By Mr_English
July 13, 2008 7:55 AM | Link to this
Thank you Furman for writing a great article. Coach Curry is going to be a huge asset for the university, wait he already is. Look at the number of columns written about him since his hire. So between Coach Barnes and Coach Curry GSU is going to be very successful.
Go State!
By JJacket
July 13, 2008 8:45 AM | Link to this
State will keep some of our players that don’t get the bigger offers from having to play at 1-aa out of state schools.
I just don’t ever see them on a level with Georgia Southern. Atlanta just doesn’t seem like it’d be a hotbed for 1AA football.
By lefty grizzle
July 13, 2008 9:07 AM | Link to this
Hey the blogger, This may help the GA Tech page where there is precious little to tout.
By GT Class of 87
July 13, 2008 9:09 AM | Link to this
Bill Curry is a pompus, overrated putz. Many of his ex-players and staff will confirm. Thank God someone had the wisdom to pass on that bozo when our AD position was open. GA State football might win or lose. But either way, Bill won’t care either way, as long as he gets his picture in the paper. Agree with previos post. The loser has nothing to do with Georgia Tech, so keep his crap off the Georgia Tech page!
By MisterT
July 13, 2008 9:16 AM | Link to this
I was at Tech when Curry was at the helm. I actually walked on for a short period, but with no real possiblity of a scholarship took a co-op job.
I had the opportunity to meet and speak with him personally on a couple of occassions. He is a fine man with high integrity. GSU has gotten a super coach to start their program. They will get off to a great start and I am sure that Curry will identify a successor within just a few years…the up & comer that was mentioned in a previous comment.
Curry was not the right man for Tech this time. While there would have been a lot of love in the room, Tech has to look forward not backward. I think Curry was more interested in the Tech AD job when DRad got it…another great decision.
Crry’s skill set lends itself to building/rebuilding a program. Tech won it’s 1990 NC just three years after Curry went to alabama with many of Curry’s recruits still in leadership positions on the team. So much for what Coach Doddd though could be accomplished at Tech. I was very dissapointed to see him go and moreso to see how he was treated.
bama won it’s first and only post Bear NC just three years after Curry left for UK. Again with Curry recruits in key positions. Stawlings was a good coach. Then if memory serves, bama was busted for recruiting violations and hit rock bottom. In all likelihood the same alumni that ran Curry out of town were responsible for the recruiting violations that set bama back over a decade.
UK made their best run in decades just three years after Curry departed. Mummy then took the program down with recruiting violations.
Curry will build a solid program at GSU. Southern will be thier biggest rival in the near future. West Georgia and Valdosta will also make great rivals. The state has plenty of talent to support these schools. Isn’t Kennesaw getting into the business too? Too bad they didn’t call Curry first. GSU should have the better budget with which to build a FCD football program.
By William
July 13, 2008 9:51 AM | Link to this
I am a graduate of GSU and I will be at the Georgia Dome in 2010 to watch this team develop. I do not care what there record is that first year as long as they are competitive and get better.
If Erk could build a championship caliber team down in Statesboro then Bill should be able to do it in Atlanta with everything Atlanta has to offer. If I am a recruit and I had to decide between Statesboro and Atlanta, I would choose Atlanta in a heartbeat. Do not get me wrong, Statesboro is a nice place but Atlanta has alot more to offer.
By Alfonzo S. Tangerine
July 13, 2008 10:25 AM | Link to this
Bill Curry is a sanctimonious fraud who only had a handful of winning seasons in his career. He was and is a terrible football coach. Furman Bisher passed his sell-by date at least 20 years ago. He was not always, but is now, a terrible columnist.
They make a perfect pair.
By alum '58
July 13, 2008 10:34 AM | Link to this
I LIVE IN VA BEACH, VA. OLD DOMINIION UNIVERSITY IS IN ITS START UP PHASES FOR ITS FOOTBALL PROGRAM. WILL BE IN THE STANDS WHEN GSU COMES TO NORFOLK. ITS ABOUT TIME. GO PANTHERS
By Ron
July 13, 2008 10:46 AM | Link to this
Great article.
By In the Ghetto
July 13, 2008 11:11 AM | Link to this
Come play for Bill Curry. In the Ghetto
By Paddy
July 13, 2008 12:04 PM | Link to this
GT class of’87…a great amount of hate from such a young lady. Be nice and give BC a chance.
By Patrick
July 13, 2008 12:35 PM | Link to this
To Bob Sacamano…if you want to get technical Georgia State has 30,000 students making it 2nd biggest school in Georgia. Therefore…we are the real GSU!
By DP
July 13, 2008 1:09 PM | Link to this
Coach Dodd’s advice to Curry was prescient. Curry has coached football with the competence of a typical airline executive.
I’m just thankful not to have to listen to the sanctimonious gasbag on the ESPN college football games anymore.
By War Eagle
July 13, 2008 1:36 PM | Link to this
Good man, if he could have beaten Auburn at Tech and especially at Bama, he would be going into Football Coaches Hall of Fame.. Bama screwed up running him out of town, but they have that scent…7-9 coaches since Bear..
By GT76
July 13, 2008 1:49 PM | Link to this
Curry will do as good a job as can be done. Still not sure Atlanta can support another college football team over the long haul.
As for DAWG fans saying they should replace Tech with Georgia State, I have a clipping from the mid-nineties when a DAWG fan suggested that in the AJC (replace Tech with Ga. Southern) and Tech went on to a national championship and beating UGA on a regular basis. It will happen again, count on it.
By GT76
July 13, 2008 1:53 PM | Link to this
Correction: I meant mid-eighties. Sorry about that.
By fmn72
July 13, 2008 1:56 PM | Link to this
Furman, as someone who has been to probably every Super Bowl, I was wondering which moment you would rank No. 1 from this list of the 25 best? http://www.tampabay.com/specials/2008/interactives/super-bowl/top-25/index.shtml
By Dawg Fan in Fla
July 13, 2008 2:28 PM | Link to this
AJC staff … wake up … un able to forward this to othrs due to “error on page”.
Thank you.
By BigMan
July 13, 2008 2:52 PM | Link to this
When it comes to coaching, Curry is a pure loser! Thats a fact, coaching record is below .500 winning percentage (.333 after winning Bobby Dodd Award). Yes, he was the best coach at ‘Bama since Bear (.722), but this so called class act guy had two-thirds of his players on academic probation! He quit on two schools and was fired during his last season! That dont sounds like the coach I’ll play for or hire! Why do the so called good ole boys keep getting another chance to coach when there are plenty suitable winning coaches that are better qualitified for the job? Bad move for GSU!
By Michael Cameron
July 13, 2008 3:23 PM | Link to this
Mr. Bisher
Thank you for a fine column about Georgia Tech’s Bill Curry. Although he is now also Georgia State’s Bill Curry — and GSU is fortunate to have garnered his services — he irrevocably remains, now and always, a part of the Tech family. As a former Tech student, a former Tech football athlete, a former Tech coach, a Tech alum, a Tech graduate, and a current Tech fan (i.e., multiple Tech bonds), he belongs to Georgia Tech as much as any other individual ever associated with the Institute — past, present, or future.
As does Mr. Jake Rudolph, honored by Matt Winkeljohn on another current AJC page, Mr. Curry continues eternally onboard. Deep relationships are not automatically deleted just because the relative takes a job somewhere else.
I wish Coach Curry and GSU much success, which will likely come to fruition with time and forbearance.
Mr. Bisher, your writing, as always, approaches perfection.
By BigMan
July 13, 2008 3:23 PM | Link to this
I agree w/ DP, I am glad I dont have to hear that loser on ESPN again too! Hope his wife dont get any death threats for being a future dome loser! He’ll lose more games in the doom than the Falcons. And please dont try to turn a pocket passer into a option QB like he did in Kentucky! Only man I know from the Green Bay era who didnt like Vince Lombardi!
By wsj
July 13, 2008 3:30 PM | Link to this
To start up the program, GSU needs a coach who is experienced, his name is known in Georgia, has charisma to sell the program to potential supporters, and can draw some publicity. Curry fits all this. Most of the recent attention has been on Curry but it also puts Georgia State in the news. GSU is sorely in need of publicity.
All Curry has to do is start up the program and lay its foundation. GSU can worry about a winning program later.
By BigMan
July 13, 2008 3:34 PM | Link to this
experienced in losing!
By GT
July 13, 2008 4:09 PM | Link to this
Furman has become the PR man for Curry, which is fine since his readership has about the same wattage of the Tech flagship radio station. The story must have been fed to FB, about Dodd because balanced reporting would have required Furman to mention Dodd was a bitter old man when giving advice, if he did, to Curry. It had taken the arm twisting of Jimmy Carter, at the White House, to even get Dodd to endorse a fund raising drive for new athletic facilities at Tech. Dodd had been booted out of his entitlement position of athletic director and shuffled over to the president of the college’s office as a PR man for the college. Bobby Dodd had come from a different era, where the prize of being one of the greatest coaches of a university or college was the athletic directorship. The job now needs one of those college educated men Dodd advised Curry he was. The problem with all this is Curry quit his college, then used the excuse that he wanted to go where he could win a national championship, then Tech wins a national championship without him, and he has the “class’ everybody seems to want to label him with, to say Ross won with Curry recruited players. To add insult to injury he comes back to Tech wanting to have that retirement position of athletic director at 65, and tried convincing people that Tech could have a national rated program year in year out, only because the previous AD had enraged Tech people by saying they were expecting too much. Now he acts like Mary McElroy just out of the blue calls him to come coach her team, this guy who has made a living as a profession lobbyist of college football jobs he is under qualified for. On a side note I never hear these glad handers say the money they are getting to guide the mediocre programs is too much, pay me and I will give you an excuse later. This column would be brilliant if it were true, you would have to take Curry in no matter what a hypocrite and hot bag of wind you think he is because most of us love Bobby Dodd. I knew Bobby Dodd and Bill Curry you are no Bobby Dodd so stop with this nonsense. And Furman you are showing your age too involving yourself in such nonsense.
By Tech Forever
July 13, 2008 4:18 PM | Link to this
Allison George huh? Wow. I can’t think of a single Tech fan who has had to deal with her who would have anything positive to say about the experience.
By YaFatha
July 13, 2008 11:25 PM | Link to this
No matter what the bleacher geniuses say, the people who know say that Bill Curry is a man of intelligence and integrity, and a damned fine football coach. And as has been amply documented, a great match for a start-up program in the heart of Atlanta. Best of luck, Bill.
By chuckwagonchuckie
July 14, 2008 9:32 AM | Link to this
Coach Curry is a class act. I wish him success.
By BIll Maron
July 14, 2008 12:28 PM | Link to this
That’s it. I am trading in my Falcon season tickets for the Panthers and never again putting up with the traffic going to see the Bulldogs - my other alma mater.
By dabaxter
July 14, 2008 1:02 PM | Link to this
Winless in Kentucky News Flash: Bill Curry = 0-11 at Kentucky! News Flash: Bill Curry fired Steve Spurrier as OC at Georgia Tech! The whining Bill Curry ran a Kentucky program that he took over with a winning record to winless his last season(with the #1 QB prospect in the nation). Do you really think he’ll do any better at his new post?
By Furman Bisher
July 15, 2008 12:54 AM | Link to this
Uh-oh, I can feel poop running down my leg! I think I had a 98 year-old accident! Can somebody hand me my bedpan?
By trey
July 15, 2008 10:41 AM | Link to this
As a southern alumni. By the time State gets established Georgia Southen will be in 1-A Mark my Words. It is only matter of time
By Tech Forever
July 15, 2008 4:13 PM | Link to this
Trey,
The WORST thing Southern could possibly do is jump to 1-A. Right now they have a unique monopoly in this part of the country. Jumping to 1-A would make them just one of the boys.
By WhoCares
July 16, 2008 8:53 AM | Link to this
Curry may be a nice guy but he sucks as a football coach.
By Trey
July 16, 2008 9:51 AM | Link to this
Tech Forever
Southern is already looking into move as we speak. We have done all we can in 1-aa in a short time. 6 national championsips. Sure it will not be easy at the beginning. But in the long term it is the best thing for the University as a whole. Southern will succeed down the road in 1-A
By Trey
July 16, 2008 9:52 AM | Link to this
Tech Forever
Southern is already looking into move as we speak. We have done all we can in 1-aa in a short time. 6 national championsips. Sure it will not be easy at the beginning. But in the long term it is the best thing for the University as a whole. Southern will succeed down the road in 1-A
By The Big Bug
July 16, 2008 7:23 PM | Link to this
GT has siad it about as well as it can be said.
By The Big Bug
July 16, 2008 7:36 PM | Link to this
GT has said it as well as it can be said. Curry had one team at Tech. When you lined up against those guys,you had to play 4 solid quarters of football or you lost.
By Michael Cameron
July 17, 2008 2:05 AM | Link to this
Some anonymous (natch) individual wrote the following comment:
*By Furman Bisher
July 15, 2008 12:54 AM | Link to this
Uh-oh, I can feel poop running down my leg! I think I had a 98 year-old accident! Can somebody hand me my bedpan?*
No, it’s really not cool to ridicule old folks this way. Consider that they’ve usually endured the tribulations of life and the pain of personal loss on a level that is far beyond your experiences.
Have you discovered the elusive Fountain of Youth? No? Then guess what might await you should you continue living into the winter years. If you do not die young, certain geriatric infirmities will introduce themselves to you; one of those bedpans may become your personal pal — and they might even put your name on it. I bet you don’t want to even think about that, though. Keep saying to yourself “those things can’t happen to me…can’t happen…can’t happen…can’t happen…”
I have a sense of humor, and what you wrote doesn’t get there…not funny at all.
There are many people who will see their fathers or grandfathers or great-grandfathers in a gentleman such as Mr. Bisher.
Whoever you are, maybe you’re, overall, a nicer person than this as far as respect for your elders. I hope so. However, to debase an honorable elderly person like that, one who will become a nonagenarian in November — but who could leave us at any time — is truly disgusting.
By Star of the Zanarkand Abes!
July 17, 2008 8:35 AM | Link to this
LET’S GO STATE!!!
By Bob H
July 17, 2008 1:38 PM | Link to this
Georgia State Univesity GSU acheved University status in 1969. More than 250 fields of study are offered to a student body of over 28,000.
Georgia Southern University achieved University Status in 1990. The university has a residential campus of 16,841 students, offers 130 feilds of Study.
Georgia State was a University before Georgia Southern, SO Georgia State is the 1st and original GSU!!!
By Bob H
July 17, 2008 1:39 PM | Link to this
Georgia State Univesity GSU acheved University status in 1969. More than 250 fields of study are offered to a student body of over 28,000.
Georgia Southern University achieved University Status in 1990. The university has a residential campus of 16,841 students, offers 130 feilds of Study.
Georgia State was a University before Georgia Southern, SO Georgia State is the 1st and original GSU!!!
By Trey
July 17, 2008 3:54 PM | Link to this
As a southern alumni Georgia Southern overall is a better expereince then State. You actuall get the College experience and everthing that goes along with it. At State you are at a Commuter university in Downtown Atlanta. I can also gurantee that the Girls are a lot better at Southern.
By GT
July 17, 2008 5:34 PM | Link to this
Reading Furman Bisher reminds me of the insolvable loss to a Division 1AA school named Furman back in the Curry days. I don’t think being on the field at Gettysburg could have been as disserting as watching a grown college lose to a half baked volunteer football team like Furman. Now this mighty gunfighter, Curry, who has already had his pants shot off him and the rest of the Georgia Tech faithful says, “Set em up one more time, I am going to beat ya left handed this time.” You lost last time fighting with a machine gun against a six shooter, what on earth says you have anything in the arsenal, more less your brains, to make this any different, plus you are 25 years older. Even great coaches, which Curry is a long way from, start losing it with age, look at FSU or Penn State. And the problem with the old guys is they don’t know when to quit and you are stuck with them forever and all their nastiness which seemed cute when they were winning but brings out the real jerk in them when they are losing. Georgia Southern was lucky enough to hire a character that was as entertaining as he was a winner, Curry would make George Bush, either one of em, look like Bob Hope.
By ED
July 19, 2008 12:17 AM | Link to this
Georgia State is becoming more traditional with more on campus housing and other improvements. It will never be completely “traditional” due to it’s location, but that is what I like about it. Most universities are out int he middle of nothing and all start to look the same. You can get “traditional” almost anywhere, but not many universities offer 4 years of living in a city like Atanta.
You know that you can only go to THE shopping stripe and Ma and Pop resturants so many times before you get sick of it.
I already have my season tickets for 2010 in the Dome and can’t wait for some serious b-ball in a couple months at the Sports Arena!
By WFC
July 19, 2008 8:19 AM | Link to this
GT: I’ve never flamed on a blog before but your insipid remarks tempt me greatly. To wit:
Furman Bisher has been a great writer for fifty years, adding to the enjoyment of sports for millions. What have you done?
Bill Curry is a solid citizen who has coached at GT, Bama and Kentucky. He has values and is a good choice at this point in his career to manage GSU’s start-up program. What have you ever done?
I had my son late in life and he teases me about being old (calling me “gramps,”) as a good son should. My response is always the same: “son, with any luck at all you will one day be my age.” GT, I don’t see that for you. Some punk will shoot your a$$ in response to the garbage dripping from your mouth. Once again, have you ever ACHIEVED anything? Didn’t think so.
By GT
July 19, 2008 11:54 AM | Link to this
WFC, I am so glad you asked. I am almost 60 years old and have managed in those 60 years to not fall in love with the good old days as fondly as our great writer Furman Bisher, who has a constant of why things can’t be like they use to be. One of the reasons why things can’t be like they use to be is the three matinee lunch is dead, all white country clubs are dying and the world as a whole is much more educated including footballs player, readers and writers. The days of Herman Tallmadge and Lester Maddox where an ignorant constituency was lead by its nose is gone and the monopoly of a writer doing the bidding of a like kind thinking person went with it.
I have worked hard like most Americans. I have not asked for millions of dollars for a job that I didn’t deserve, spin the facts to increase my perception of worth or showcase the fact that I have character conveniently to override any flaw in my abilities as if winning cannot be accomplished and is handicapped with the burden of character. Money and fame should be reserved for the exceptions of our society and I am willing to admit that is not me.
I have raised two daughters. I have left their world better than mine. No bear feet in the kitchen and the self confidence to stare down this world of false perception and call it what it is. No one is going to shoot me or them and that kills macho guys like you because you have to live with the facts and all the bullying in the world or PR spinning can change them
By GT
July 19, 2008 12:30 PM | Link to this
because you have to live with the facts and all the bullying in the world or PR spinning CAN’T change them. Like I said I ain’t perfect and am willing to admit it.
By WFC
July 20, 2008 7:51 AM | Link to this
GT: I, like you, am almost 60 and have lived my entire life in the South. I hold no brief for Lester Maddox or the days of segregation. In fact, I was crucified in early 1970’s Cobb County basketball for starting a black player for the simple reason that he was a better player and I wanted to win.
Nevertheless, Furman Bisher has written elegantly for fifty years about sports. He is not now, nor has he ever been racist. He promotes the southern heritage and the history of Georgia sports. That’s a good thing.
Bill Curry was a magnificent player at GT and an honorable man. Nobody can take that away from him. He’s a good choice to start the GSU program and then turn it over to an “up and coming” guy. What’s the problem?
By WFC
July 20, 2008 8:03 AM | Link to this
GT: one more thing. Have you EVER actually coached a football team? I coached a bunch at St. Pius and Crestwood. I grow weary of BS from guys who sat in the stands and ALWAYS call the right play AFTER THE FACT.
By Skip
October 20, 2008 10:45 AM | Link to this
Nobody “ran him out of town” at Bama. I’m sick of hearing that ignorant crap. Neither the AD nor the President said anything to Curry about leaving. He got his iddy biddy feelings hurt for being criticized and ran away like a big wuss.
Having said that, he will be good for starting the program at GSU. Afterwards, they should get a coach who isn’t so thin-skinned when it’s time to get on the porch and bark with the big dogs. Good luck, GSU.