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Home > Terence Moore > Archives > 2008 > June > 30
Monday, June 30, 2008
Driesell happy to see football at Georgia State
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Long before Georgia State officially had a football program, folks already were suggesting that Georgia State should have a football program.
Just take it from Lefty Driesell, the man who gave Georgia State that big-time attitude in athletics after he arrived in 1997 with his accomplished credentials as a college basketball coach. He made Panthers hoops relevant in the land of Bulldogs and Yellow Jackets during most of his five-plus seasons on campus, but it mattered only to a point. He discovered the truth, and that is, there always is that pigskin thing in the air around here.
“I remember one time we went to a basketball something at a sports club (in the state of Georgia), I don’t know, somebody put it on, and they had little footballs on the table,” said Driesell, over the phone on Monday from his summer home in Bethany Beach, Del. “I made a joke out of it, and said, ‘Hey, this is a basketball banquet, not a football banquet. It just told you that it is a great football area.”
Maybe too great. That pigskin thing in the air has combined with Driesell’s basketball success at Georgia State to cause university officials to get carried away. He retired in January 2003 with a record of 103-59 that included a trip to the second round of the NCAA tournament after winning 29 games for the 2000-2001 season.
Now Georgia State has come out of nowhere to invent a I-AA football program that will compete in the Colonial Athletic Association starting in 2010. With former Falcons coach Dan Reeves as the point man, university officials spent a year raising more than $1 million in pledges. They later enticed the student-faculty committee to raise the activity fee $85 per semester. Then they hired college coaching veteran Bill Curry. “So they’re going to play (home games) in the Georgia Dome?” said Driesell, with a slight chuckle. “I don’t know how they can afford that.”
Driesell wondered about Georgia State’s ability to fund football, period, especially since he said, “In basketball, you’ve got 13 uniforms that cost maybe $75 apiece, and most of them are free from Nike or somebody. In football, you’ve got all of those players on the team, and then you’ve got to buy pads and cleats and, well, you know what I’m saying.”
Here’s what Driesell isn’t saying: That the Panthers shouldn’t play football. He said they should. Then again, he has to say as much, because he set the foundation for all of this. After joining the Panthers following celebrated stints at Davidson, Maryland and James Madison, he kept promoting this crazy idea that a massive commuter school in the middle of a southern city could do wonderful things in sports.
“They say location is important in real estate, and that’s also true in athletics,” Driesell said. “I liked Georgia State’s possibilities because it is in Atlanta, and Georgia State is a big, state university in which you can get about any major you want there. So I could see it doing well for recruiting in basketball, and the same goes for football recruiting.
“People love football down there. They’ve got Bill Curry, and that was a great choice for them. Then you’ve got Georgia State with 30,000 students. I mean, there probably are some pretty good football players already there.”
The Panthers will need them, along with fans. And a few more pennies wouldn’t hurt their cause, either.
