The Face-Mask

By Phil Williams

“The Face-Mask”

(#5 in the Bobby Bowden ‘tribute series’)

1979 was shaping up to be the best in Florida State history by the time Coach Bowden took our team, with a 7-0 record and #6 ranking, up to play lowly Cincinnati. 8-0 was a cinch…or so we thought.

But with a little over 11 minutes left to play we found ourselves on the wrong end of a 21-7 score. We also faced a 4th and 5 from somewhere around midfield, and Riverboat Gambler, as coach Bowden would later be called by some, was busy dialing up a ‘do or die’ play in his mind.

I was standing beside him ready to run the play in. He grabbed my face-mask and looked me in the eyes.

“Okay,” he said. He then rambled off the formation and the basics of the play, finishing with…”X Drag.”

“Well, I’ll be damned!” I thought. “I’m X!”

For those who don’t know, the drag route is possibly the scariest thing any football player is called to execute, and sometimes ends up feeling like an execution (got it?). Simple, yes, but dangerous. It requires darting up the field for about 5 yards, planting the outside foot, and then sneaking across the middle of the field where the linebackers lie in wait, drooling to bone-crunch whoever comes their way. The pass, the hopeful catch, the hit - all usually happening within the blink of an eye. I thought about suggesting, “Hey Coach, do you mind changing that to an out route or something?”

Did it flitter across my mind that perhaps Coach Bowden was resting his hopes of an undefeated season on my shoulders by calling the pass to me? Why yes, it did, so all I wanted to do was sprint to the huddle, call the play, run out to my spot, and get this thing over with without thinking about it. Just do it.

But perhaps he was having second thoughts. Maybe he was wondering the same thing. Was he out of his mind, calling such an important play to a former walk-on who only had made a dozen or so catches so far in his fledgling career? If I were him I would have questioned myself, too.

As it so happened, I literally turned my body to run the play in to Wally Woodham, our quarterback, who was anxiously awaiting the play call, the clock ticking away, but Coach Bowden couldn’t seem to let go of my face-mask. He jerked my head back around. I ain’t kidding, folks, he JERKED my head back around, and just about stuck his head inside my helmet with me.

Eyes bulging and spit flying. “Don’t drop it!!!”

And then he released my face-mask.

To be clear, most folks think it is not a great idea for a coach to tell a basketball player “not to miss” the free throw that might win or lose a game, or a pitcher “not to throw a ball” on a pitch where a strike is imperative, but hey, pressure does strange things to all of us. And like I said, Bobby Bowden was human, whether folks realized it or not.

I remember thinking, “Geez, really?”, before hauling my ass in there, giving Wally the play, sprinting out wide to the left, sneaking inside the hashmarks, somehow eluding the bloodthirsty linebacker, and finally, making a seven yard catch for a first down. It was all lightning fast, which is what I wanted, so that I did not have time to think, “Don’t drop it!”

Ten minutes later, or so, we scored the go ahead points with a little over a minute left and escaped Cincinnati with our record still unblemished.

Looking back, I was so very thankful that Coach Bowden had the faith in me to make that call.

Interestingly, over forty years later we would reconnect at his home and discuss many of the stories I am sharing in these posts, like this one. I’ll save that for later, though, and share - in what I expect will be my last post in this ‘tribute series’ - his response to that tense moment in Cincinnati in early November, 1979.