Bill Curry's coaching legacy

Sports

Bill Curry's coaching legacy

After more than 20 seasons coaching, Billy Curry ends Saturday in Maine.

In August, Bill Curry announced 2012 would be his final season as Georgia State head football coach, concluding a 20-year career that began a few miles away at his alma mater Georgia Tech. At 70, he will retire Saturday after the Panthers final game of the season at Maine.

Often saddled with building or rebuilding projects, Bill Curry would endure more losing seasons (11) than winning ones (7).

Bill Curry, a native of College Park, played for 12 seasons in the NFL as a center of two Super Bowl winning teams. He began his coaching career as an assistant at Georgia Tech in 1976 where he once played center. He would move on as an assistant in the NFL and return to lead the Yellow Jackets in 1980.

Curry went 31-43-4 in seven seasons at Georgia Tech. His 1980 Tech team played No. 1-ranked Notre Dame to a 3-3- tie.

Curry's teams produced huge wins over Georgia in 1984 and ’85. Georgia Tech quarterback John Dewberry gets a hug from Bill Curry and a piece of the hedge that surrounds the playing field in 1984 at Sanford Stadium in Athens.

Curry, who also played at Georgia Tech, was named the ACC Coach of the Year in 1985 by the Associated Press and the Atlantic Coast Conference media.

Curry coached the University of Alabama for three seasons from 1987 to 1989. He went 26–10 without ever beating state rival Auburn. His Tide team won a share of the SEC title in 1989 - team's first since Bear Bryant. Curry was honored in 1989 as the SEC Coach of the Year and received the Bobby Dodd Coach of the Year Award.

During Curry's tenure at Alabama, one of his most memorable wins was the so-called Hurricane Bowl against Texas A&M in College Station, Texas. Originally scheduled to play in September, Curry refused to fly to Texas due to the threat of Hurricane Gilbert. The hurricane never came, but the game was rescheduled for December, when the Tide routed the Aggies 30-10.

Curry followed his stint at Alabama with a 26–52 record in seven years at Kentucky. His Wildcats were .500 only once with one appearance in the 1993 Peach Bowl.

After more than a decade away from football, Bill Curry was named as Georgia State University's first football coach in 2008.

Georgia State University coach Bill Curry is knocked to the ground as he was doused doused with water by players celebrating the team's first win - 41-7 over Shorter College - at the Georgia Dome in their inaugural season in 2010. Since then, the team has amassed 10 wins over three seasons.

“Georgia State football is going to be a great success — just later than I thought,” Bill Curry said in 2010. The Panthers went to their first bowl game in 2015.

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In August, Bill Curry announced 2012 would be his final season as Georgia State head football coach, concluding a 20-year career that began a few miles away at his alma mater Georgia Tech. At 70, he will retire Saturday after the Panthers final game of the season at Maine.

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