Welcome Back, Jacksonville State!

By Jim Joanos

Sixty-one seasons have come and gone since the Jacksonville State Gamecocks football team from northeastern Alabama, on their way to a highly successful season came to Tallahassee and shut out the Florida State Seminoles, 7-0. As one of the 3,700 fans present the last time the two teams played, I am looking forward to the rematch on Saturday, September 12th.

THEN: When they met previously on December 6, 1947, both schools were in the "small college" athletics category. Jacksonville State Teachers College, as the visitors were officially named then, had been playing football for a number of years. Florida State, on the other hand, was playing in its very first season as a coeducational college after forty-two years as an institution with a student body of women only.

The 1947 game was played at Tallahassee's Centennial Field, a facility that was built primarily to house a minor league baseball team. The fans sat in portable bleachers along both sides of the field. Occasionally, during game nights you could smell the fires burning in the fireplaces and wood stoves of nearby Smokey Hollow. Train tracks ran along the hill just beyond the right field fence and on occasion, a train would go chugging by, smoke billowing out of its chimney.

Ed Williamson and Jack Haskin

Jacksonville State came into the game boasting an 8-0 record, having shut out four teams earlier in the season. They were expected to blow out the Seminoles who stood at 0-4 in the makeshift schedule that had been put together very hastily. The visitors, a seasoned and experienced team, were led by fullback and alternate captain Johnny Williams who would at the end of that year be proclaimed a Little All-American. The FSU team had no established stars and was made up of military veterans and former high school players who had been practicing together for only about three months. The two FSU coaches had no previous college coaching experience and had volunteered from the physical education teaching staff. The head coach was Ed Williamson. His assistant was Jack Haskin, who would later begin the FSU Flying High Circus.

Ken MacLean

The game began as most had expected. FSU had first possession of the ball but fumbled deep in its own territory. Relying heavily on Williams, their All-Star, the Gamecocks marched 29 yards in a few plays to score a touchdown and convert the extra point to make the score 7-0. But then, the game turned into a defensive battle. Playing at their best that season, the Seminoles kept the visitors out of the end zone thereafter. Although, the FSU team was itself unable to score, holding the highly touted Jacksonville State offense to a mere 7-0 victory was something of a moral victory. Enough, so that the next day's Tallahassee Daily Democrat story of the game proclaimed in its headline, "Battling Band of Seminoles Goes Down to 7-0 Defeat." A positive story, it mentioned the contributions of several FSU players. Mentioned was the running of Ken MacLean, the place kicking of Leonard Gilberg, a 61-yard quick kick by Bo Manuel, a 27-yard pass completion from Ralph Chaudron to Charles McMillan, a tackle for a loss by Jim Costello and the interception by Chris Kalfas of a deflected pass.

The 1947 game ended a glorious 9-0 season for Jacksonville State and a beginning 0-5 one for the Seminoles. Since then the two colleges have been on different tracts. Both have been successful. The Jacksonville State program has progressed until recently in the "smaller college" category. In 1957, the school was renamed, "Jacksonville State College" and in 1967 it became, "Jacksonville State University." In 1992, the Gamecocks won the NCAA, Division II football national championship. In 1996 they moved up to NCAA Division I AA status (now called the "Football Championship Subdivision"). More recently, they have begun to play some of the bigger schools and this year, for example, in addition to the Seminoles, the Gamecocks will play Georgia Tech a week earlier. FSU, on the other hand, since 1947 moved rather rapidly into the major college football ranks. By the mid fifties, the Seminoles were playing the more established programs and by the sixties had attained a great deal of success in bowl play. Since the seventies, the Seminoles have been competitive among the very best and in the nineties won two national championships in the NCAA's top category (now called the "Bowl Subdivision").

NOW: Jacksonville State should not be taken too lightly. Their record in 2008 was 8-3. They return 18 of 24 starters. Their offense is led by senior quarterback Ryan Perrilloux who transferred to JSU a year ago after spending two years playing for LSU. At LSU in 2007 he was the Most Valuable Player in the Southeastern Conference title game and helped in the National Championship game victory that year over Ohio State. For JSU in 2008, his passing and running accounted for an average of 244.2 yards per game.

FSU, on the other hand, following an opening game against always tough Miami on Labor Day night will have only four days of rest before meeting the Gamecocks. Following a 9-4 record in 2008, they return 12 of 24 starters. The Seminole quarterback, Christian Ponder, a redshirt junior, averaged 186.8 yards of passing and running per game.

I look forward to the return match that I have been waiting sixty-two years to see.